


whoever opens the door for you

by orphan_account



Series: Orphanage Verse [6]
Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: F/M, Kid Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-01
Updated: 2010-03-01
Packaged: 2017-10-11 21:27:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 33,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/117306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Part of the Orphanage Series - Harry/Ron Big Bang entry.</p><p>Two years after the orphanage was set up, Harry and Ron find themselves with a new addition – a boy who might be more trouble than he's worth. Especially when Draco Malfoy proves persistent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is more of a fairy tale than anything else. I wasn't going for realism :) Just as a disclaimer: RL orphanages are vastly different. Also, excuse my faible for original characters. I can't help it. I love writing them.

_September - a Friday_

News rarely arrived on a Friday afternoon. Friday was usually the day Harry and Ron took some time off to spoil themselves, which meant having marathon sex in between lots of hot showers, films, and delicious ordered food. This particular Friday instead had been filled with grocery shopping and keeping an eye on the kids amongst housework and preparing lunch and filing the last receipts for the month.

September was coming to a close. The house was emptier now, with Billy, Epicia, Sonia and Martin at Hogwarts. But the biggest difference was the reaction the absence of July elicited.

Since his brother had left, June had been moping and sullen and completely impossible to talk to. On the plus side, though, there was no loud fighting, no trampling of two pairs of little feet all over the house, or getting woken up at six in the morning to listen to bickering over cartoons from the library, which was where they'd put the only TV in the whole house. Ron was still a little wary of them.

Harry wasn't worried about the sulk. June would get over it. Ron had said he remembered when Fred and George had gone off to school, how at first he'd felt utterly betrayed and left behind. Apparently, he'd quickly realized how much more freedom he had with his brothers gone.

What this meant, though, was also that there weren't any moody teenagers at home anymore - no one whining about school work or studying, and no one to tease about secret boy or girl crushes. It was just the adults, and the little kids. Harry wondered if he should feel relieved or disappointed that they were hardly ever _bad_ kids. The worst any of them had ever done was to play footie in the entryway downstairs, which Ron had expressly forbidden them for their own safety. Of course, the chandelier had gone to pieces. In hindsight, Harry thought, the smart thing to do would have been to hex it to a place no one would ever find it.

Harry, on this particular Friday, at midday, was just busy chopping potatoes for the evening meal, wondering what was keeping Ron so long - he'd promised to be back at noon, and dropping off one message at the Daily Prophet couldn't possibly take four hours - when the fire turned green with a whoosh and Ron returned.

He didn't look all right, not at all the bouncing happiness Harry had expected to see after a collision of Ron and the new Seeker of the Chudley Cannons. He looked shaken and tired and his mouth was turned down at the corners, which was so rare these days that Harry felt his heart squeeze tight.

"What's going on?" he asked, dropping the knife. He rinsed his hands and dried them off, heading over to accept the quick hug that Ron was looking to give.

"Incident at the ministry," Ron said. "Neville dropped by the Prophet's editorial office to tell me about it."

"Did something happen?"

"Yeah. Remember when I told you a few weeks ago Ginny's team was going to the Welsh coast near Aberdaron because of unauthorized use of memory charms in that area?"

"It was supposed to be a routine mission," Harry said. He was relieved that Ron's sentence hadn't started with 'Voldemort', however scared he was for Ginny. It had been so long that he should really be over it by now, and he knew he would have felt something if Voldemort had been involved in any dubious activity, but fear like this was hardly ever rational. Which he knew. Knowing didn't help, sadly.

"That's what everyone thought, but it turned out to be a Death Eater nest." Ron rubbed the bridge of his nose. "They had some trouble. Ginny lost a team member -"

"Who?"

"- Morgan. Killing curse, so at least it was quick. They were just surprised. So were the Death Eaters. They had two deaths, one capture, and a handful or more escaped."

"Bloody hell." Harry shook his head.

"Neville's working with Ginny to track the apparitions but it's hard, since they're erasing signatures as they go along, and they've split up. And Violet says the guy they captured isn't talking." Ron took a deep breath. "But that's not why Neville came to talk to me."

"What else did they find?"

"Beside a mansion full of dark artefacts and leftovers of every power-raising and life-restoring ritual you can think of? There were children."

Harry felt his hands clench involuntarily at his sides and forced himself to relax. "Are they okay?"

"As okay as they can be," Ron said. "For four of them, we found some family, even if it was very extended. You know how pureblood families are interrelated. Hermione got her hands on it and managed to find fairly well-adjusted branches of their families to place them in until court battles begin."

Harry winced. Hermione was going to get no sleep in the next few months.

"But there's one kid left, and he's in bad condition."

"What do you mean, bad condition?"

"St. Mungo's bad condition. Nutrition deprivation, energy drainage, and it looks like someone used him as their own personal punching bag." Ron didn't look too happy. "He'll be out of it for a day or two more, but Nurse Pierpont said we can take him after the observation period."

"We can take him - wait. Wait, Ron, what are you saying here?" Harry blinked, feeling steam-rolled. "Take him? Here? We don't have room for another kid, Ron, you know that."

Ron rolled his eyes. "Half of the kids aren't even _here_ right now, and who knows how long Talin is going to stick around. He's been looking to rent a flat by himself for a while. We can ask Martin and Billy, I'm sure they won't mind sharing a room for the few weeks of winter and summer holidays. And who knows if this boy is even going to stay for longer. He looks like he might be of age, and once we find out his name -"

"You don't even know his name?"

"The other children had no idea, they said he mostly just sat there, not speaking with anyone, and that no one ever claimed him as theirs."

"Who beat him, then?"

Ron grimaced. "Ginny said, from the looks of it, it must have been the other kids. Which would explain their reluctance to talk about him at all."

"And he's not conscious." Harry sighed. "Ron..."

"It's going to be fine. He just needs a place to stay for now. Hermione said if we don't take him, he'll stay in St. Mungo's until he's fully recovered and then probably be handed over to the Muggles."

"Why?"

Ron frowned. "What why?"

"Why would you hand him to a Muggle orphanage or something? Shouldn't he be able to live fine on his own in the wizarding world, if you say he's of age and once he's healthy again?"

"Oh, right. He... has no magic."

"What?"

"Hermione's pretty certain he's a squib."

Harry stared at Ron for a second, then he closed his mouth and looked at the ceiling. "Fine," he then said. "All right, you got me. Here's one kid who apparently has all the cosmic bad luck in the world. Just - just know that you're writing to Billy about the room merge. I'm washing my hands of this."

Ron grinned. "Thanks, Harry.

Harry pointed his finger at him. "Don't thank me yet."

"Aw, and here I was planning on owing you a whole _night_ of gratitude..."

"All right, all right, I'll take it," Harry gracefully succumbed.

"You're a hero," Ron teased and tugged on his shirt to pull him close and kiss him on the lips before he could say more.

 

~*~

 

Sheryl took care of the kids when Harry and Ron left the house in the early afternoon to do a check-up on the boy in question.

"She's an angel," Harry said wryly as they apparated into the entry hall of St. Mungo's on the first floor. "Are we paying her enough?"

Ron snorted. "Shut up, you know it's her secret ambition to take over from us once we're both old and gray-haired and unable to deal with a bunch of pre-pubescent horrors. She's learning the trade, so to speak. No payment necessary."

The hospital was as always buzzing with people. Mediwitches and wizards were hurrying past, and the line at the reception was long enough to remind Harry that there was a reason people usually spent the whole day here.

"Yeah, no," Ron said. "I know the room number, and I have the card of the healer in charge. There it is. It's... Healer Brown." Ron stared at the card. "You think this one has anything to do with Lavender? I think she mentioned a cousin a few years older than her going to med-school."

Harry gave Ron a long look.

"No, I didn't think so either," Ron said, and moved forwards.

 

~*~

 

Healer Brown turned out to be a distant relative of Lavender after all, but they didn't get to talk to the older, very energetic woman for long before she cleared their access to the kid lying motionlessly in the bed and hurried off to see her next patient.

There was another bed in the room, at the far other end by the window, where an old man was lying, staring outside without blinking. He didn't turn when they entered.

Harry had to look twice to make sure he wasn't seeing things. The boy couldn't possibly be of age; he was small and fragile, with pale skin that made him seem anaemic, even though Healer Brown had said it was just the Skele-Grow putting him out of commission for another night. But the strangest thing was that the long, straight nose and the pointy chin, along with the blond hair reminded him strongly of someone.

He turned to Ron. "He's a _Malfoy_?" he hissed, trying to keep his voice down so they wouldn't disturb the man by the window.

"He's not a Malfoy," Ron said shortly. "C'mon, Harry, you can't know that."

Harry glared.

"Look who you're talking to, Potter. You're not the only one with a lifetime rivalry, and mine goes a lot further back than yours." Ron pulled him closer to the boy's bedside. "He doesn't even look like Malfoy."

"You're right, the resemblance is barely there," Harry snarked.

"Malfoy never looked this innocent, I bet, even as a baby. And anyway, Malfoy didn't have any siblings, you know that."

"How do I know that? How exactly would I, seeing how close Malfoy and I were at school? Seeing as how we fought on opposite sides for most of the war, and the only thing that saved his sorry arse was that his family did a 180 when they realized we were closing in and helped in Voldemort's capture?"

"Don't forget that they put the greatest part of their savings towards the rebuilding of our society," Ron reminded him humourlessly.

"If this boy is really a squib, I don't doubt they'd have hidden him away somewhere. He certainly looks like he spent most of his life in a dark cellar."

Ron rolled his eyes. "Keep your voice down, and also, that's exactly my point. Who cares what he is? He doesn't have anyplace to go."

"I don't have a problem taking in this boy; I don't care about his family name!" Harry threw up his hands. "But think this through, Ron! If he's a Malfoy, they might be scared that he'll talk. There might be something about him the Death Eaters need. You can't know what he is. Why did they keep him alive if they didn't need him for anything? He wouldn't be the first kid to vanish."

"You think they'd come and get him back?" Ron asked, eyes darkening with worry.

"I don't know what I think. It's possible? I don't want that kind of trouble near Betty and May. April and June can at least protect themselves with what little sparks of magic they have, but Betty and May don't have that advantage. What if something did happen?"

"So you just want to leave him here and not help him? Let him get shipped to a Muggle place, where the Death Eaters can get to him easy and torture him a little more?" Ron put his hands on his hips. "Honestly?"

"No!" Harry sighed. "No, no, you know I'd never want that. Damnit, when did you start always winning arguments with me?"

Ron gave a small laugh. "Since the first time we played chess against each other? Always three steps ahead of you, love, you know me. By the way - how nice that we had this discussion here where everyone could overhear."

"At least we had it."

"Yeah, well. You can sit with him for a few minutes and talk to him while I look over his chart, try to make some sense of it. Healer Brown didn't tell us very much, did she? Just that he won't wake up today, so we don't need to stay long - we'll ask her if we can come back tomorrow morning to arrange a way to get him to Grimmauld Place."

"And tonight, we're having a tea party with a few of our friends from the Auror facility - and Hermione and Bill, maybe. So we can update our wards and add some new ones. Lock down tight, just in case," Harry warned. "I don't want any accidents."

 

~*~

 

____spacer____

Talin came home for dinner that night, which was unexpected. Friday night was usually film night at his friend Alison's place. May, his biggest fan ever since he'd given her a remote-controlled miniature train for her birthday, threw herself at him the moment he stepped through the door, and he had to sit down on his seat with a seven-and-three-quarters year old girl perched on his lap, holding her tight.

Sheryl had had June help her prepare the food, which had made it his vote. Harry didn't want to know how they'd arrived at chicken sweet and sour on American pancakes, but it sort of worked for everyone except Betty, who started turning up her nose at the smell, and got her usual yoghurt-and-cubed-cheese mix instead. He was definitely giving her greenery for birthday food when she turned four, Harry decided. Since having had something as birthday food made it her favourite by association.

"What happened with Alison?" Sheryl asked Talin when they'd all passed the stage of starvation and proceeded to move on to a slower, more companionable pace of eating.

"What? Oh." Talin poked his pancake. He grimaced in a way that said he would have preferred not to talk about it. "Ali has a boyfriend now, so for all intents and purposes, Friday is no longer film night."

"Oh dear," Sheryl said, giving him a sympathetic look. "I'm so sorry."

"It's fine. I mean." He shrugged. "It was just a matter of time, right? She broke up with Rafael before NEWTs, and let's face it, three months without a boyfriend is a long stretch for her."

"What about you?" Ron asked, ignoring Harry's kick under the table.

"What about me?"

Ron finished chewing his chicken bit and said, "Are you okay with your stretch?"

"Ron!" Harry sighed, hitting his forehead with his palm.

Talin flushed bright red, as always when someone asked about the state of his love life. "I'm totally okay with my stretch," he said. "Sheryl, how about you, any new boyfriends on the horizon?"

"Smooth," Sheryl laughed. "But no. All the boys in my classes are - let's say, they're not the type I'm looking for as a suitable mate."

"How's that?" Harry asked, and felt Talin's shoulders drop in relief. He helped June clean up - his whole face had somehow ended up plastered with sauce - and finally gave up when June proclaimed that he was done anyway. "Fine, go and wash up, then. Don't know why I bothered," he sighed, throwing the napkin.

"I want to go too, can I?" May asked. "I'm done!" June was already out of his seat, flying towards the bathroom. She looked after him, jealous. The play time between dinner and bedtime was the most precious play time of all, Harry had found out very soon after he'd started this little endeavour. It was to be dragged out as long as possible and savoured in all variations.

"All right, go, but don't forget -"

"Thanks Sheryl and June for dinner!" May yelled, and hopped off her seat, running after June to the bathroom.

____spacer____

____spacer____

Betty threw a spoonful of yoghurt on the table before her, and laughed.

"Ugh," April said, and sat back in her chair. "That's a little disgusting."

Ron raised his eyebrows at Harry and cocked his head to the side. "How come they always explode all at once?" he asked.

Harry rolled his eyes and got up to clean up Betty's mess. "I'm only doing this because it's your turn to put them all to bed tonight," he said. Sheryl laughed and started getting up to help, but Harry shook his head, and said, "No, no, I have it. You can go on telling us about the boys in your classes, if you want."

Sheryl waved that one off with her hand. "Never mind that. But if you wanted to share, I'm still waiting for a heads-up about tomorrow? Before you forget and head off to bed without letting us know?"

Harry rubbed his eyes and reminded himself that heading off to bed was not an option just yet. He heaved Betty out of her chair and to the ground, while Ron said, "It's not that big a deal. There's no need for anything fancy. A few people from St. Mungo's are bringing over a new boy, but he won't be able to get up for at least a day or two, we assume."

"Oh, is that why all the new wards are installed?" Talin commented. "I wondered."

"You noticed?" Harry turned to him, surprised.

"They're fairly obvious when you're looking," Talin said. "I did write my Defence NEWT on the warding of inhabited buildings. I'm interested."

"I didn't think of that," Harry said, feeling a sting of guilt. "I'd have sent Hedwig to let you know I had experts coming over for tea and warding, you could have watched them set it all up. I'm really sorry."

"It's okay, Harry," Talin smiled. "You're busy, and I know how the kids get when strangers come in the house."

"Next time," Ron promised him. "Or - when we're fairly certain there's no danger, we'll have some of the precautionary work removed, and we'll make sure you're here for that."

"Danger?" Sheryl threw in, and her forehead creased with concern. "Wait. You keep saying 'the boy'. Who's he? Does he have a name? Is this part of why this has all been so short-notice? Does this have anything to do with that Death Eater nest that the Daily Prophet reported on a few days ago? Ginny told me a bit about the stuff they found, it sounds nasty."

"Yes to pretty much everything," Harry said, exchanging an amused look with Ron. "Except the bit about the name. We have no name yet, he's not regained consciousness. We're hoping to get more information out of him when he wakes up tomorrow."

"Are you sure it's okay that I stay the night?" Talin asked. "I'm sure I can stay somewhere else if you need the space. I don't want to be in the way."

"Don't you dare. You can always stay here, you know that," Ron interrupted him before he could get going.

"The room situation -"

"Is taken care of. Martin agreed to share with Billy for as long as our guest is staying."

"Oh. All right." Talin smiled gratefully. "Thanks."

"Though, Sheryl," Harry said, as it just occurred to him. "Maybe if you want - only if you want - there is something you can do to help out."

"Whatever would help you guys out," Sheryl agreed.

 

~*~

 

Whenever Sheryl was the centre of attention, it had usually to do with her looks, or with surprising those people who didn't expect her to be smart with her intelligence. She had a mirror, she knew what she looked like, and she knew how to use it to her advantage, but that hardly ever made it any better.

Today, though, the staring put a different kind of pressure on her; for once, the attention was on her because of a very important task. She had a feeling that she really shouldn't disappoint, otherwise, the new boy could end up even more traumatized, and scared enough never to open up to another person again. It was a huge responsibility to have.

Thankfully, neither Ron nor Harry thought the boy would be dangerous, which was a relief. Apparently, they only thought he could become dangerous by way of proximity to the people who might or might not be after him. She didn't have a lot of personal experience with Death Eaters. She hadn't even seen the ones that had made her family's house go up in flames, leaving her the only survivor of a Muggle raid. She'd been sneaky that night, gone to the pub with school friends to celebrate her GCSEs; she was pretty sure her mum wouldn't have approved.

The thing was; she wasn't sure if this was going to work. The main criticism to this plan was that while the young, very fragile-looking boy would probably indeed feel more comfortable talking to a person approximately his age, and non-magical - the fact that a collective of wizards was standing _around_ her rendered the first idea completely void.

"This is not going to work," she said finally, when she looked around and realized that one more person had entered, a green-dressed Healer from St. Mungo's.

"Why not?" Ron asked, pursing his lips. "He's fine, he's in a bed, he's surrounded by two competent Aurors, two people who have temporary guardianship and are ex-Aurors, Hermione, and Healer Brown. There's nothing to be afraid of."

"Except for the part where he might feel like he's _suffocating_ when he wakes up," Sheryl told him. "Look, I can do this. You can come in later, but when he wakes up and sees all of you standing around his bed, staring down at him, he'll feel like he's being dissected."

"We're not leaving you alone in here with him," Ginny protested. She even had her wand out. Sheryl had been to the Auror facility once, and meeting Alastor Moody had been quite enough to make her understand why Ginny was constantly vigilant. It was funny, until it turned a little sad.

"No, I think Sheryl's right," Hermione intercepted. "I don't think this is a comfortable environment for a child to wake up in, especially as this is an unfamiliar place for him, too. Healer Brown, you're certain he's going to wake weakened and in no state to attack anyone?"

"Oh, absolutely," the healer said. "The potions he had to take especially for the head trauma have to be consumed in combination with the Draught of Peace, and the Blood-Replenishing Potion always leaves patients in a state of light befuddlement for at least half an hour after consciousness has been regained. There shouldn't be any problems. Though I must protest my leaving the room. If there are any health complications -

"I'll call you in?" Sheryl proposed. "Look, it's not like you don't have other stuff to do anyway, and who knows when he'll wake up. We could be waiting for hours. I'll sit with him. Ginny, didn't you tell me just recently that your paperwork is reaching your ceiling by now? Harry, Ron - I'm pretty sure Betty and May will be delighted to get to spend some time with you guys again, you've been neglecting them, and they're feeling it. Hermione, if you wanted to stay close-by and have nothing better to do, I think April had some very important Hogwarts-related questions for you. Since she thinks you're the cleverest person in the world, it would mean a lot."

Ginny's partner exchanged a long look with Ginny. He was new, Sheryl could tell. Ginny was known for switching her working partners constantly, especially when they were guys. Ginny had told her once that they all claimed she was hard to work with, but that it was really just because Ginny was the one holding the reigns and most guys didn't know how to deal with that.

"No," she finally said, and turned to Sheryl. "You're right, there are other things we can be doing. But be careful. Don't get hurt."

"I won't," Sheryl promised.

"Come on, Bevin. Time to report back and get some of that paperwork done."

"But Ginny, our orders were clear -"

"Do I look like I care? We'll deal with it when the time comes to deal with it, now stop complaining." The door closed behind them.

"There goes another one," Hermione commented under her breath. Sheryl felt a giggly tickle in her chest.

"He's really not waking up, is he?" Ron asked.

Healer Brown gave him a stern look. "There's no way to accurately predict something like this. Anytime between eight am this morning and noon would be considered within the time frame the potions predict."

"He didn't mean to sound accusatory," Harry tried to placate her. "It's just too early in the morning, and he hasn't had his coffee yet." He glared at Hermione. "Which, by the way, is all your fault, and you will pay for this at some point. Karma never sleeps."

"How is Ron's coffee addiction _my_ fault, exactly?" Hermione protested.

"Can we stop talking about Ron as if he's not in the room?" Ron asked. "Also, I think I saw a right eye twitch."

Sheryl looked more closely. There was indeed a twitch. Everyone held their breath. Then the twitching stopped, and the boy's breathing stabilized. Everyone let out their breath.

"You really should leave," Sheryl tried for the last time. "You're putting me under pressure. It will be a lot easier to get information out of him on my own."

"Are you sure you'll be all right?" Harry asked. He sounded defeated.

"Yes. Everything will be fine. What's the worst that can happen?"

"He could turn out to be a Malfoy," Ron muttered under his breath.

"Ron!" Hermione scolded. "Don't be an arse. Sheryl knows what she's doing. I think we should leave this responsibility to her. Healer Brown, if you could, I would love to hear more about the Potions and Charms that were prescribed, just for reference. Over a cup of tea, maybe?"

It didn't take long to talk Healer Brown around, even though her sense of duty was astounding. Hermione crooked her fingers at Sheryl in a little wave before they finally exited, leaving only three.

"Fine," Harry gave in. "Fine, we'll go. We'll go downstairs, bring you breakfast in a few minutes, and keep checking in every twenty or so minutes. But you _have_ to yell if _any_ thing happens, all right? You still remember your martial arts defence classes?"

"Yes, Harry. Do you want me to lift you over my shoulder to prove it?" She grinned.

Ron took Harry's hand. "Don't let her!" He was grinning too. "Your back will never be the same again."

"All right, all right, I get it, I'm a worrywart. Sheryl -"

"I promise, I promise, now go. I've got a book, and you'll bring me breakfast, which, wow, what a service, and my life will be complete, at least until baby boy here opens his violet blues."

Ron opened the door, pulling Harry along. Harry's expression was still dubious.

"Here's another way to spend your morning, by the way," she offered after them, and she could see by the expression on Ron's face that he knew what was coming. Harry's expression was wonderfully oblivious. "You could try having sex again sometime! If you can keep it down enough not to have the whole house know about it, at least."

Harry's blush gave him a stunning likeness to a tomato, while Ron just stuck out his tongue at her and closed the door, but he wasn't quite fast enough for her not to hear when he said, "You know, she does have a point..."

 

~*~

 

End Part 1  
  
---


	2. Chapter 2

_September - Saturday_

 

 

"We really shouldn't leave her alone with him," Harry said.

Ron could already see the rant forming in his lover's head. He really would have preferred there not to be any ranting. Sex was the much better option; especially since there hadn't been any had in the past week.

When they'd started dating a few weeks after the battle of Hogwarts, right after the attack on Diagon Alley, there had been loads of sex. Ron reconsidered: 'dating' might be the wrong word for what had happened. A complete mental breakdown and a good, hard fuck probably weren't in the definition.

They had worked themselves out, in the end, and Ron was certain the sex had had not little to do with it. Harry had been so tense all the time, ready to snap any second; after sex, he'd always had that languid, comforted expression on his face, especially when it had been rough and fast before it got slow and soothing.

"Harry," Ron interfered before Harry could get to the rant. "I think Sheryl was right - that tenseness _has_ to go." Then he shoved Harry against the hallway wall, kissing his mouth, hard and demanding, smacking his hands away when Harry wanted to grasp him by the waist.

Harry didn't protest, which was not all that surprising. In a lot of ways, Harry craved what sex meant - the human contact, the touching, the pure physicality of it - a lot more than Ron ever would, simply because he had so much time to make up for. Not that Ron kept the cuddling scarce. And now that they had a house of kids to take care of, having a moment to oneself was the rarer of the two options.

At this point, Ron had to stop himself and reminded himself not to think of the kids while they were doing _this_. Harry's mouth was warm and welcoming under his own, and he let Ron push his tongue between his lips, kissing back while making those gasping little noises Harry always made when he was really turned on.

  
____spacer____

"Right," Ron gasped against his cheek when they parted, pressing their hips together, trousers chafing. "Why don't you write me a post-it next time you're this desperate for it?"

"Funny," Harry half-glared. "I'm not the one pushing people into random walls in the middle of -"

"Okay, shutting up," Ron said, and resumed the kissing. Their bodies were so close, a sheet of paper would have had difficulty crawling between them, and Ron enjoyed the press of Harry's chest against his own, the way he could feel Harry's intake of breath, his heart's thudding.

He pushed Harry further up, and Harry got immediately what he wanted, let him between his legs, spreading them, hitching one up over Ron's hips, letting him grind so that their erections brushed. They both gasped at the feeling, and really, if it only took this much to get them this hot, Ron thought, it was just _sad_.

Harry was warm under his fingers when Ron let go of his hand and pushed his own up his shirt, running his palms over Harry's abs, and up, up towards his chest to rub at his nipples, which he knew would make Harry want to drop his trousers right here. He wanted that, wanted to unzip them with his teeth and bite at Harry's cock over his underwear, and then pull it out and lick it -

"Oh god, Ron, stop it," Harry said. "Stop talking or I'm gonna come in my pants."

Ron thrust his hips forward and into Harry, making his head thump back against the wall, and said, "Good," and he hoped his grin was as anticipatory as Harry's voice when he'd said that. Beside Sheryl and the boy occupying the room at the end of the hallway, this level of their house was empty, because all their teenagers were at Hogwarts, which meant the probability of interruption was fairly low. He considered getting this down right here and now, no regrets.

At that point in Ron's mental contortions to not have to go the few steps further to make it to their bloody bedroom, of course, the universe decided to punish his impatience and general laziness. A little figure appeared at the landing of the stairs to their floor, hair messy and pouting, and called, "Harry, Harry, can you please stop smooching Ron now and help Betty? I think she's peed in the bed again." Which pretty much killed the mood.

April had a knack for that. Instead of hanging around, though, she just rolled her eyes - looking remarkably like Hermione, despite her respectable six and a half years - and vanished again.

Harry took his leg down, looking pained.

Ron put his chin to Harry's forehead, sighing with regret. "Why did we do this again instead of moving to the Scottish countryside to live peaceful, boring lives filled with great food, the occasional sheep, and loads of sex, preferably not in that order?"

Harry grinned, and pushed him away an inch so that he could reach up and peck Ron onto his mouth. His eyes were sparkling happily. "We like the kids."

"Ah," Ron said, like an epiphany. "We like the kids. That must be it."

"Harry!" April called again, this time from downstairs and sounding more impatient.

Harry snorted. "I'm coming, sweetie," he yelled in her direction, and said to Ron, "Go, kitchen, make Sheryl some breakfast and check up on her while I clean up Betty. We'll meet in the bedroom in -"

"- ten minutes. Sheryl's going to have to accept toast. I'm not making bacon and eggs with this sort of trouble in my pants."

"Ten minutes," Harry agreed, and didn't protest when Ron got another kiss, deep and satisfying, and palmed his dick while he was at it.

 

~*~

 

Harry and Ron's room was on the second floor, just like Martin's former room which was now occupied by their guest. Talin felt bad about the little one having to vacate his room, and for Billy to have to share again. It wasn't fair for them to have this kind of upheaval in their lives, when it had taken them so long to adjust to what they had in the first place.

He could have given up his room. Though when he thought about it as he slowly stepped towards the door, it made sense for Harry and Ron to put the boy _here_. There was no one else on this floor during the school year, beside the two adults. Putting him in Talin's room would have meant having him right next to May and April on one side, and opposite June, whose brother had left for his first year in Hogwarts a few weeks ago.

Harry had also explained that the boy might not even be staying for long. He was older, almost Talin's age. There was a chance he could be on his feet in a few weeks. He might not want to stay and prefer to be by himself, maybe find a flat before Christmas. In that case Martin and Billy wouldn't even notice anything had changed. Not, Talin thought with a half-grin, that Billy wouldn't kick up a fuss anyway. He loved being the centre of attention.

There were no sounds coming from either Harry and Ron's bedroom - and he hadn't seen them upstairs when he'd checked up on May and April - which meant either they were fast asleep, or they had a silencing charm up, a thought which made Talin blush. There was only one reason for that.

There were no sounds coming from Martin's former room either, and there was definitely no silencing charm on that one, in case Sheryl needed to scream for help. The house in general was very quiet since Hermione and Healer Brown had left an hour ago, both of them having work to do. The clock showed that it was past noon now. It seemed their guest hadn't woken up yet.

Talin knocked softly on the door, deciding to investigate. There was no response. He knocked again, then slowly pushed the door handle, thankful that he'd brought his wand along. His gaze fell first onto the seat Sheryl had pulled up to the bed - someone had transformed it into a comfortable cushion seat. She was fast asleep in it, curled up, her mouth half-open as her chest rose with each breath.

Then he glanced to the bed and startled. The boy was sitting up against pillows at his back, and was watching his every move. His eyes were wide awake and a little scared. He didn't make any sound, just kept staring. Talin felt awkward at the intensity of the look.

"Morning," he murmured, trying to sound confident but at the same time not as loud as to wake Sheryl. He didn't know why, but he felt like it might be important that there weren't two of them against one of him. "You're awake," he added. Then flailed a little. "Call me Captain Obvious."

The boy kept staring. Talin didn't know whether he imagined it, but it felt like he'd quirked his lips just a tiny bit. It made Talin feel slightly less embarrassed. "I'm Talin," he tried. "Do you know where you are?"

The boy shook his head.

"What about your name?"

Second head-shake.

"You don't know your name?" Talin stepped closer.

The boy hardly moved, but it still looked like he was trying to crawl into the farthest corner of his bed. His shoulder was pressed against the wall. It looked uncomfortable.

Talin stepped back again, and lowered his hands, palms flat. "It's okay. Nothing's going to happen to you here. It's a safe place for children." He frowned. "And me."

There was no reaction to that. Talin looked around, unsure what else to do or to say to make the boy believe him. Sheryl was still asleep. It didn't seem like the kid would talk to Talin, but maybe he'd talk to Sheryl. She had a knack for stuff like this. She was never as awkward or uncomfortable around people, and she always knew the right words to make someone feel better.

"Sheryl?" he tried weakly. "Sheryl, maybe -"

The boy made a sound of protest. When Talin turned back to him, his eyes were narrowed.

"She'll help," Talin said. "I'm no good at talking to people, I tend to say nonsense and - oh, all right. If you really don't want me to. But can I? It's okay, I promise I won't hurt you."

The boy didn't protest, and didn't even scoot away when Talin approached this time and sat down on the edge of the bed gingerly. He just waited. Talin glanced at Sheryl, who was still sound asleep. He felt an instant of worry. Her room was right next to the baby's, after all, and though Talin had been there when she'd agreed to share responsibility for Betty, especially at night, he didn't think it was fair.

Well, it wasn't his place to say anything. He could however let her sleep right now and try to help out with this unexpected turn of events. He just hoped he wouldn't screw up.

He looked back to the bed and found the boy watching him with interest. Talin smiled at him shyly. "Do you want a name?" he then asked, because it was the easiest way to start, and the only thing he could think of to say that didn't run the risk of being hurtful. He hoped.

A hesitant nod.

"Harry and Ron - you know. The adults around this place, they're sort of the adopted parents of the orphanage, though you can just say Harry and Ron. Anyway, Harry and Ron got into the habit of calling kids whose names no one knew after the months when they found each other, so we have May, and April, and June and July who're brothers, and to be honest, he found them in June, but they didn't feel like sharing a name, I think." Talin took a breath, and pulled his knee up onto the bed. "Anyway, that would make you September."

They stared at each other for a while.

"No," Talin then said with a snort. "I don't like it either. It's too long, and you don't look like a September at all." He flushed. "Not that you look like any other month, I mean, you look fine, obviously, you just don't _look_ like - never mind."

He could swear this time, the corners of the boy's lips moved up before he ducked his head.

"I think my mum wanted to name me Taliesin," Talin kept going. "But it's a bit of a mouthful, too. I definitely got lucky, and it's sure better than Cuthbertus, which, don't laugh, is my unfortunate second name that no one can ever know about." Talin nodded. "I figured you would keep the secret, since you don't actually... _talk_."

Definitely a smile now. Talin felt his stomach curl with pleasure, and the back of his neck grow warm.

"I'm open to taking suggestions," he tried. "I mean. I could - oh. You - how about..." He reddened under the curious gaze of the eyes which had inspired this one. "Hazel," he said. "Maybe. Like your eyes."

The sheets rustled as the boy tilted his head to the side slowly and shifted forwards, not even with his whole body, just his fingers, stopping an inch before Talin's on the bed. He was paler than Talin was, and his hands smaller, but not delicate, which was surprising; he had no idea why he'd expected it, but they definitely weren't manicured and flawless, instead covered with little scars from old cuts and blisters, calluses just visible on his palms.

"It's nice," the boy said finally, voice rough from disuse.

Talin's head rocked up in surprise. "What?"

"Hazel," he said, like he was tasting the word. "I like it. It's nice."

And so Hazel it was.

  
____spacer____

~*~

 

Harry woke up with the feeling of Ron's arm heavy on his chest, and the even breathing of sleep in his ear. It took him quite a while to realize where he was, and what time it was, because he was dozing and the room smelled of fresh laundry and sex and Ron, and there were no other sounds, just the two of them. It reminded him of those first months after Voldemort's capture, when they'd figured out what they wanted from each other, and that they actually loved each other and wanted to be together. It had been just the two of them then, and a whole lot of time and space (and various beds).

He shifted his weight, slowly managed to get Ron's arm off his chest without disturbing his lover's sleep. Ron probably needed it, he'd been the one to get up lately more often than Harry had to soothe worries and fears and chase away nightmares and the scary creatures that lived under the beds. Harry had a feeling the kids had voted Ron to be their favourite night-watcher simply because his approach tended to be biscuits and hot milk, whereas Harry made them get back to bed and count sheep. Or dragons, or whatever it was that made them feel safe.

He kissed Ron's cheek before slipping away, feeling their skin sticking together from sweat and other bodily fluids. Ron protested with a mumbled groan. Harry gave him all the blankets and a pillow to curl up to, and grinned down when Ron accepted this in his sleep and stopped grumbling. Then he allowed himself two more minutes of staring down at Ron's body, which was stretched out and beautiful as it had ever been. Harry himself had had some muscle definition back during his Auror and then Quidditch days, but now he was back to being the scrawny, scrappy stick that had made him such a good target for bullies everywhere, growing up. Ron on the other hand seemed to somehow find time to work out enough to keep in great shape, because he simply could not be tall and strappy by nature, he just couldn't. Harry had to admit to a little bit of envy.

Then he remembered that about three hours ago, he'd gotten to play with that body quite a bit, and that it was practically his anyway, especially his to enjoy and to caress and - Harry grimaced. Now his own body thought that it was going to revisit that enjoyment. Not the time, he reminded himself. Cold shower, and then he was taking on the day.

He let Ron sleep, and entered the adjoining bathroom, fresh clothes from the laundry basket in hands. There was no telling what Sheryl and their new guest were up to, nor if the other children had somehow managed to burn down the house - though he was assured that if anything were to happened, none of the kids had any scruples to come into their room despite the silencing charm.

Harry left about ten minutes later, freshly showered, hair driopping onto the carpets which they'd had redone back when they'd decided to turn Grimmauld Place into a mansion fit for the living, and crossed the hallway over to Martin's old room.

He listened for a second, heard the soft murmur of voices and knocked lightly before he entered the room. He was not prepared to see Talin sitting on the bed with the new boy, who was awake and seemed to be doing well, and Sheryl sleeping on a nearby cushion, covered with Martin's favourite blanket, which he'd left at home for the first time this year when he'd left for Hogwarts.

"Hey, Harry," Talin greeted him, moving to get up.

"No, no, sit down, I was just checking in to see if everything was fine. The house is awfully quiet." Then he gave the boy a worried look. "How are you? I'm sorry, but Healer Brown, the lady who's been taking care of you at the hospital, had to get back to work. I'm Harry, though, and if there's anything I can do, let me know, okay?"

"We were just talking about you," Talin told him. "And Ron, of course. Hazel wasn't sure where he was, so I thought it would be good to explain what you guys do."

"Hazel?" Harry asked, eyebrows rising.

Talin nodded. Then he flushed. "Like his eyes."

Harry could see the boy look a little embarrassed, too, like maybe he hadn't wanted to share quite that much, like maybe he'd hoped it would stay a secret. He tried not to show how surprised he was that Talin was bonding with someone. It wasn't that Talin was hard to be around, but he'd never been good at making friends. Harry was pretty sure he wouldn't have known many people in his own year at Hogwarts even, if Alison hadn't become his friend and invited him to join her group of friends now and then.

"It's a good choice," Harry said to Talin, and felt warmer at once when Talin smiled happily at the praise. Then he turned to Hazel. "Is it all right if we call you that here? It would be fine if you preferred another name, maybe your real name -"

"That's my real name now," Hazel said. His voice wasn't icy per se, but the way he said it left no room for discussion.

"Hey." Talin frowned. "Easy."

Hazel immediately pulled back, pressing further into his corner. "I'm sorry," he said. "I apologize." He looked scared again, and incredibly sad, the corners of his lips trembling.

"No, it's all right." Harry knew he could have handled that one better. Talin was looking distraught now, too, and like he wanted to reach out to touch. Talin never looked like he wanted to touch anyone, so this was a development that made Harry reconsider the whole plan of action about this situation. He wished, suddenly and fiercely, that Ron was here. They usually did this stuff together. It was totally fine if one of the kids needed to have a 'bad guy' and a 'good guy' at first. They'd played up to each other that way so often now, it would have been easier to accept if Hazel had picked Harry as the one to rebel against, and Ron the one to confide in.

This way, he just felt alone and unsure what to do. He'd known it was going to be hard - any new addition to the house was hard, they were always so scared and shy at first, careful not to overstep the boundaries of hospitality in case it might get them thrown out, and Harry and Ron, while wanting to be _good_ , also never wanted to take the place of the child's parents, unless they were really young and didn't remember differently, like Betty, or April a little bit. It was a balancing act through and through, and it didn't always turn out well, either.

The silence was just starting to grow heavy, and Talin fidgeted, looking from Hazel to Harry and back to Hazel, when a yawn startled them all from the cushion. Harry tried not to show his surprise - he'd forgotten Sheryl was sleeping just behind him.

"Oh my God," Sheryl then burst out, blinking when she realized there were two other people there, and that Hazel was awake. "I fell asleep! I can't believe - how did I fall asleep? And how -" the blanket slid to the floor. "Oh." She blinked a few times, glancing at Harry with a guilty expression, but her attention was caught by Hazel, who was sitting up stiff like a board, hands clenched to fists, and was staring at her with something Harry could identify as part terror, and part such utter hatred that he wondered for a second if they knew each other.

Sheryl got to her feet at that glare, too. She didn't look scared, but she definitely didn't look comfortable with the expression on Hazel's face. "What's going on?" she asked, uncertain. "Did I interrupt something important?"

"It's not you," Harry said, voice as calmly authoritative as he could manage. "Hazel?"

Hazel gripped the cover of his bed between his fingers and dropped his gaze from Sheryl, but he didn't quite manage to hide the hostility.

Talin moved, shuffled just an inch closer, reaching out to touch - but Hazel drew away with a sharp intake of breath, at the same time slapping Talin's hand hard, the sound echoing loudly in the room. Talin flinched, stung, and stumbled off the bed and towards the door, not looking anyone in the eye as he closed it softly behind him. Harry wasn't quick enough to call him back, or try to salvage the situation.

"Okay, that's _enough_ ," Sheryl said sharply. "It's Hazel, is it?"

Hazel scowled, but didn't look up.

"I don't know what I did to you, but that was really unfair, Talin was just trying to help. Scowl and glare all you want, but leave him alone." She had put her hands on her hips and her face was reddened with irritation.

Harry grimaced. This was going spectacularly wrong, but calling her back now would make her feel like he was chastising _her_ , and he wasn't, she was right, though this was not the perfect time, maybe, to give a newly arrived, scared little boy who'd probably been hurt a lot a reality check.

"Sheryl," he interrupted her, placing a soothing hand on her arm. "Maybe you could go look if Talin and the rest of the kids are all right? Thank you."

Sheryl lifted her chin, and he felt a flash of fear that she might simply refuse, and then he'd be in even deeper shit - but instead, she let out her breath in a puff and her shoulders slumped. "Fine," she said. Harry gave her a grateful smile. She shuffled towards the door, where she turned to him once more and added, "Sorry about falling asleep on the job."

"Don't worry about it. It's our fault, we've been stressing you out - no, don't protest. We'll talk about it later, all right?"

Sheryl nodded, and left without another word - or any glance to Hazel: she seemed to have decided the best way to deal with him was to ignore him. Not that Hazel was giving any more attention to her, or to Harry for that matter. Harry had to admit that he was glad for the little break he got to collect his thoughts. It had been bad enough when they'd doubled up on him - maybe three people at once had just freaked him out. It wouldn't surprise Harry at all.

He tried not to make too much noise while he pulled up a chair to the bed - close enough to make Hazel know he was there, but far enough to give him space to withdraw, and definitely far enough to not be in touching distance. He was pretty sure he wouldn't be welcome on the bed anytime soon, like Talin had.

Hazel didn't move through the whole ordeal. He kept his head down, fringe hiding his face, and his fists clenched in the material of the cover. Harry had to suppress the thought that he had an uncanny likeness to Malfoy in all his teenage glory with this particular expression on his face.

"Let me explains a few things to you," he started. It seemed the reasonable approach, especially since Hazel didn't seem inclined to talk. Then something occurred to him. "Though - I won't force you to listen. If you don't want to do this right now, I'd understand. If you need some quiet, or if you're tired. Are you?"

Hazel's fingers slowly unclenched. He nodded hesitantly. But when Harry was about to get up, he cleared his throat, and said, "No. Don't - please. I want to know." He stopped, and when Harry didn't say anything, just gave him time, he finally continued, "Talin explained a little. But not - not enough."

"Talin's a good boy," Harry said gently.

Hazel nodded.

"But I guess you want to know more about where you are and what you're doing here?"

Hazel nodded again.

Harry leaned back in his seat, and started at the beginning. "You know about Voldemort, and the war, right?"

"Yeah." Hazel looked away quickly.

"I thought so, considering where we found you." Harry waited if maybe he wanted to say anything to that regard, but his hope that Hazel might open up and tell him about what had happened wasn't to be fulfilled today. He hadn't expected it so fast, but there had been a chance. Hazel didn't bite, staying silent, so Harry continued, "I guess you've also heard about my personal history then?"

Hazel nodded.

Interesting. Harry saved that information for later. "In the months after the war, I realized that no matter how hard my childhood was growing up without parents, I was actually lucky to have a roof over my head, and a family to take care of me, however badly they did that. I'd seen a few kids myself during the previous years who ended up orphaned. So about two years ago, Ron and I decided to restore the house of my godfather, who'd died, so that at least a few of those kids could have a place to live. That's where you're now. Grimmauld Place, London. The long story short, anyway."

He paused, let that sink in, then he said, "You're welcome to stay as long as you want. We want you to at least stay until you feel rested and healed enough to brave life, and if you'd like to, even longer. However long you need, and even afterwards, there'll always be space for you here. This will be your room, for now. There's enough food to keep an army on its feet in the kitchen and the pantry. And the bathroom's just down the hall, so we'll get you a spot on the shelves, there, too, and towels and whatever else you might need. Do you get what that means?"

Hazel tilted his head to the side to finally meet Harry's eyes. The pinched expression was gone. He looked a little shocked now.

"It means for now, you're part of this household, if you want that. If you don't want that, we'll figure out something else. We're not sending you out to rough it on the streets, or anything. I know a few people at the ministry who help me out in a situation like that, and though they're always hard up for beds, you are still technically a patient at St. Mungo's hospital, so if all else fails, you can stay there for a while. For now, it would be best, though, if you stayed here."

Since Harry didn't expect any actual response, or even an answer to that immediately, he didn't leave much of a pause, just enough to let that sink in. Hazel swallowed, but otherwise didn't give any indication whether he was going to take Harry up on the offer to leave.

"And now for the biggie," Harry said, leaning forward a bit just to make sure he didn't lose contact with the kid now. "If you decided to stay, with all the accommodation and rights that come with belonging here, though, there are rules."

Hazel pulled in his shoulders. That told Harry a lot more than he wanted, and yet exactly what he needed to know. He winced inwardly, but hoped it didn't show on his face when he continued.

"It's nothing horrible, but it's really important that we're on the same page on this one, before we let anyone actually live here. We have other children here beside you. Four little ones who aren't old enough to go to Hogwarts yet, five teenagers who're at Hogwarts full-time, so you won't meet them for a long while. And there's Sheryl, and Talin. Sheryl's a Muggle girl, so she's not going to Hogwarts, she's going to college nearby, and Talin's figuring out what he wants to do with life now that school's over."

"We love them, and care about them a lot, so let me spell it out for you: Ron and me, you can be a jerk to; we're used to it, and you've been through a lot. You get free shots for now. But the way you treated Sheryl and Talin before, that's not okay. You don't get to be hateful to the other children living here. That's the one golden rule, all right? Bickering, a little teasing even, or fighting like siblings, that's all fine. The other kids do that, too. But no intentional hurting. We are really strict when it comes to that."

For a few more minutes, Harry waited patiently in his seat, wondering if Hazel would say anything to that. He didn't, though, he just stared at the blanket before him, unmoving. Harry thought it was a bit strange that he could sit still for extended periods of time like that - he hadn't moved a finger while Harry was speaking. But that would be food for thought later. Right now, it was important that they deal with the safety issues first, and made sure Hazel was fit to stay if he wanted.

Finally, when he figured Hazel would have asked or said something by now, if he ever would, Harry got up from his seat. His legs cracked, and his back did from the long sitting. He grimaced at his own bones. He wasn't that old yet, after all.

"I'm going to go and see if I can't scrounge up something for lunch now. It's one o'clock, and everyone will be hungry. Feel free to think about what I said, or sleep, or just - well. You could get up, I guess, but Healer Brown said you shouldn't move out of bed for at least another day, so it would be better if you stayed here for now. I'll be back in a little bit with food and drinks and - let me know if you want anything else, all right?"

He was by the door already when Hazel moved, the sheets rustling. "I'm sorry," he said. He was staring at the wall opposite the bed, and he was picking at his own fingernails nervously. "If it's okay, I'd." He hesitated.

Harry nodded to go on.

"Can I - I want to say sorry. To Talin," he said softly. "If he wants to come back."

Harry felt himself soften, even though it made him feel sad that it was just Talin, and Sheryl apparently wouldn't be getting an apology. Still, it was a start, he told himself, and forced a smile. "I'll talk to him," he promised. "Would you like somea tea? Water's on the bedside table. It's yours to drink as much as you want."

"Thank you," Hazel said.

"I'll bring you some books, too," Harry told him. "If you want."

 

~*~

 

When Harry got to the kitchen - not without running into May, June and April playing hide-and-seek up and down the stairs - he found Ron busy cutting tomatoes into little slices by the table already, preparing what looked like the beginnings of lunch. A look to the sink revealed Talin scrubbing salad under a stream of water, his mouth pressed closed, eyes downcast.

"What are we making?" he asked in an attempt at non-committal before he could breach the topic of upset with the boy.

"BLTs," Ron said with a grin. "Talin's recipe. As you can see, I was reduced to simple slave labour while he's in charge of lettuce and putting the little buggers together for public consumption."

"You guys need any help?" Harry walked over to the kettle, which stood close by the sink. Ron caught his eye on the way, and raised his eyebrows, pointing his chin at Talin in inquiry. Harry rolled his eyes in response and mouthed 'I'm working up to it'.

He gently touched Talin's lower back when he passed behind him, and was glad when Talin didn't pull away. He'd been jumpy, back when he'd come here two years ago, both parents dead, no other family to take him in. Friends of his parents had pulled strings at the Ministry, Harry knew - Neville personally had asked the favour, knowing Talin's parents from working with them during the war. Harry had never met Talin's parents, or worked with the Ellwoods when he'd been an Auror, but he'd been all too willing to have an older boy stay, and Ron, who'd known the Ellwood family ("purebloods, very well-respected, but sadly carrying on single-sons for the past few generations - all Ravenclaws, I think?"), had known Talin from the odd get-together during his early childhood, when Talin had been a toddler.

"You okay?" Harry asked him now, careful not to overstep any boundaries, while filling up the water for the tea.

"I'm fine," Talin said curtly. He closed the tap, done with the salad.

"So you wouldn't mind taking Hazel his sandwich when you're done with that?"

Harry could see the 'ah' on Ron's face as Ron caught up - he was quicker than Harry with all those silly interpersonal relation issues, something Harry sometimes felt was really unfair, seeing as, using Hermione's words, he'd had not a teaspoon of tact during their school years.

"I don't know," Talin said, rather more snappish than Harry knew from him. "Will he slap me again if I do?"

Ron's chin snapped up at the words, a frown immediately forming between his brows. Harry could see the thoughts on his lover's face, and hurried to reassure. "Is your hand all right?" he asked, reaching for it, not really expecting Talin to let him - and he was right, Talin pulled away, stepping away from the sink. There was a towel he grabbed to dry off his hands.

"It's _fine_ ," he said. "It's not - it's the _principle_ of the thing -"

"I know," Harry said soothingly. "And I talked to him about it. I think he understands that he did something wrong, because when I was leaving, he said he'd like to apologize to you if you wanted."

Talin pressed his lips together again. "What about Sheryl?"

Harry was glad Ron chose this moment to interfere, because he had had no idea what to say that wouldn't make Talin even more upset. He was pretty sure taking it one step at a time would be better, though, than for both Talin and Sheryl to shun him from the start because of that little incident.

"What even happened?" Ron asked, looking nonplussed. "A bloke takes a nap for an hour, and _things_ go down!"

"The short version?" Harry sighed, rubbing his nose. "Sheryl fell asleep and - Talin went to check on her? Then I joined, and Sheryl was still asleep, at which point everything was going okay still. But when she woke up, Hazel had a really strange reaction to her, all glare and he got very defensive."

"Wait," Ron said. "Hazel?"

Harry snorted. "Way to prioritize. But yes. Hazel."

"So, no Malfoy then?"

"We can't know that, seeing as Talin chose the name for him."

Ron's gaze swivelled back to Talin, surprised. Talin ducked his head.

"Oh man," Ron said, and then with his usual tact, a hint of amusement in his voice, "You like him!"

"I do not," Talin said crossly, threw the towel and fled the kitchen.

"But - what about lunch?" Ron called after him. Not that Talin cared.

"Great job," Harry sighed, sitting down opposite Ron, kicking his leg under the table. "Now you scared him off."

Ron shrugged. "He'll get over it, you know how he is. I think he's more upset about the blow to his pride than anything. From what you said, Sheryl might be the bigger problem. She didn't say anything about knowing him, did she? If he really hates her, he had plenty of time to hurt her while she was asleep, I guess?"

Harry nodded. "Don't tell her that. We never should have left her alone in a room with him, anyway. How were we so stupid?"

"She had a good argument," Ron said wistfully.

"Yeah, well. I liked it too. Doesn't help me feeling horrible now, sadly. I'll go look for her - I think she's upset too, though you know Sheryl. She won't show it. Maybe she knows why he reacted to her the way she did." Harry put his forehead to the tabletop. "It can't ever be easy, can it? Just once, it could have been smooth sailing from start to finish."

Ron reached out and touched his cheek gently, smiling. "Don't beat yourself up. Nothing happened, and Sheryl can take a glare. Hell, for all we know, he somehow figured out she's Muggle and that set him off. Who knows how much of the Death Eater shit he bought while he was with them."

"Good thinking." Harry caught his fingers and squeezed, smiling back. "Are you good finishing the sandwiches? I'd help, but Sheryl -"

"Yeah, yeah, go. Talk to her. I think I can manage a few pieces of bacon and slapping everything on bread. And tell the kids to come here, I don't want them to leave crumbs all over the house."

Harry got up, went around the table to kiss Ron on the mouth. "Did Hermione leave a note saying when she'll be back?" he asked before leaving.

"For dinner. She's bringing Chinese from that Muggle place she loves so much, so that's taken care of, at least. And I think Charlie's joining us, too, did I tell you he's back in England? I got a letter, he can't wait to see his goddaughter."

Harry grinned, because they both knew Charlie was a sucker for little May, and spending time with her whenever he could, and it was always a hilarious sight, because she made him play dress-up and pirate games and he could never say no to her. Then something occurred to him, which he decided to propose later, when things had calmed down, maybe in the evening.

 

~*~

End Part 2  
  
---


	3. Chapter 3

_September - Saturday and Sunday_

 

The last thing Senecio remembered from the house he'd been cooped up at for what felt like months was the yelling and screaming of nearby children, then someone pointing a wand at him and the sensation of a stunning hex hitting him frontally, knocking him out.

He could have thought further back, to the hours and days and weeks he'd spent there, but he was fairly sure that would be neither useful in his current position, nor would it help him preserve the illusion that everything was fine.

The thing was - right now, everything _was_ fine. He'd woken up in a warm, comfortable bed that smelled of lavender and laundry day, in a cutely boyish room that he had to admit was really close to what he'd dreamed of having when he'd been a few years younger (and still sometimes did, though he wouldn't admit to that). The carpet showed racing cars and the roads they could travel on, and he was fairly sure whoever lived here had a bunch of miniature cars to go with it. There were a few posters, Quidditch, he assumed. A broomstick in the corner, when he leaned forward to catch more of his surroundings.

Even though he'd upset Talin, who'd been really nice, and the woman who'd been sleeping on the cushion, no one had actually beaten him for it yet, or worse, hexed him. He'd half expected her to do it, the way she'd looked at him - but maybe the presence of Harry had stopped her. Senecio tried not to think too much about what everyone had always said about Harry Potter, and the disconnect of meeting him now. He seemed... _nice_. Not at all fanatical. His glasses were fun, though, and his hair was strange, Mistress had been right about that.

His stomach grumbled. Harry had said he'd bring food, but one could never know. They might want to just keep him inside the room to starve him out and then make him give them information on whatever it was they wanted. Not that he had a lot of that. It wasn't like anyone had actually talked to him, or talked at all, for that matter, whenever he was near enough to overhear. They'd mostly just done magic to him. They'd called it 'purging', whatever that meant. It wasn't like he'd been allowed to ask. Maybe that was what they wanted to do here, too.

He pondered for a while what to do next. Getting out of bed to slip out of the room seemed like a great idea at first; but he was also wearing pyjamas, and he had no idea how many people were stationed outside, just waiting to strike him down if he tried anything funny.

He was surprised at himself how little fear he felt - then again, very little could come close to the past few months and years, so he wasn't sure what to be scared of anymore. Vicious hexes, probably. More vicious hexes than he'd felt till now, anyway, not that those had been comfortable. They were more painful than a simple beating, anyway. Good thing most of the kids who'd been at the mansion hadn't been allowed to use magic, or he was pretty sure he'd have ended up dead, 'accidentally'. He didn't want to die. He didn't know why - there really wasn't a specific reason to _live_ , either - but something inside him balked at the thought of giving up now.

Maybe he could at least find a weapon. Something to defend himself with if they tried anything bad. But then they'd kill him, and even if he managed to make it out of the house - he had very little hope anyone outside would want to help him. He knew what he was, and how wizards looked at him. He wasn't worth anything. And he doubted he could make it as far as the Muggle world.

He laid back down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, a wave of dizziness catching him by surprise. His body hurt, but that was nothing new. He'd felt stronger, though, when he'd woken up. Now the strength was gone again, leaving his hands shaking. He bit his lip to keep from making a sound and curled up, burying his face in the pillow. He really - he couldn't do anything but wait. It was the same everywhere. Except now, he thought bitterly, he'd heard Harry's side of the story, and something inside him wanted so badly to _believe_ that story, that he'd not - that they'd not use him here, and not treat him like dirt. He didn't want to let himself believe that. He knew how much worse it would get if he did and then it turned out that it had all been a lie.

Senecio, who reminded himself that he was 'Hazel' now, closed his eyes and forced himself to stop worrying. He thought of the shy smile on Talin's face when he'd found the name, when he'd said it. How nice and gentle he'd been, even though they'd never met before. It made him feel warm and sort of safe, and there hadn't been anything that had made him feel like that for a while, so he used that, and put his arms around himself, holding on to the sensation.

 

~*~

 

The rest of the day was spent in a dazed lull, which was unusual for the inhabitants of Grimmauld Place. Ron wasn't about to complain, though. It had been utterly foolish of them to have sex at that particular time - he was close to blaming Sheryl for putting the idea in their heads, but honestly, he was twenty-three and there hadn't been anything interesting going on in the bedroom for over a week, and, well, impulse control wasn't one of Ron's strengths. Especially when it came to Harry and making love to Harry.

While Harry, under the mantle of food distribution, talked to Sheryl, tried to calm down Talin, and went upstairs to see what May, April and June were up to beside playing hide-and-seek, Ron wrote a few notes to people he owed replies to, flooed over to the Daily Prophet to see if the Saturday edition had gone out as promised, and then made a short trip to the Burrow, because he could read Harry's mind, he was just that good, and he knew exactly what Harry was about to ask him in the evening.

"Afternoon?" he called once he arrived to an empty living room, and no sounds coming from the kitchen. The Burrow was usually quiet these days. It wasn't abnormal, and at least, it wasn't a mourning quiet anymore. Fred and George wouldn't have wanted people to _mourn_ for them. But with Ginny sharing an apartment with a few Auror mates nearer to the facilities downtown, and Bill and Charlie travelling abroad so often, that only left Percy, who was probably home most of them all.

"Mum? Dad?"

"Ron!" That was neither mum nor dad - Charlie's voice, and then his frame showing up by the stairs, was unmistakable. "What are you doing here?"

"Dropping in for a quick visit," Ron said, and accepted an one-armed, warm embrace from his brother. They hadn't seen each other in months, and Ron only now realized how much he'd missed him.

"How's Harry?" Charlie ruffled his hair, grinning.

"Dealing with the house and the kids," Ron replied wryly. "Cooking, cleaning, you know."

"He isn't."

"No, he isn't," Ron gave in, breaking into a grin as well. "Since I'm the only one doing any actual magic of the two of us, housework falls to me, more's the pity. But anyway - how are you? How was your trip?"

"Great. We got a great support from the Bulgarian government, now that Krum's shown some interest in regulating the exploitation of dragons by the Quidditch industry, and Romania's let themselves get pressured into some deals. I came back here to have Hermione look over some contracts, we're hoping England will jump on the bandwagon with this - didn't I already write you this?"

Ron nodded. "Hermione said something, too. But you might be in for a longer stay. She's swamped at the moment. Did you hear about that Death Eater nest Ginny and her team surprised on the Welsh coast?"

Charlie's eyebrows went up. "I read the article in the Prophet, if that's what you mean."

"There'll be court battles over the children that were left behind. Purebloods, apparently, and Hermione'll be trying to make sure they go to parts of their families that aren't attempting to find You-Know-Who and rise him back up to former glory."

"Right." Charlie frowned. "Well, I'll talk to her Monday, I guess. For now, it's family week-end time. Talking about which - how's my favourite goddaughter?"

"May's doing wonderful. You can always drop in, you know that. Actually you might be able to talk to Hermione this evening already, she's bringing dinner to Grimmauld Place, and you're invited. May's been dying to see you."

"Sounds good."

Ron looked around then, realizing they were still standing practically in the doorway. "Look, I didn't want to stay long, I don't want Harry to get mad at me for dropping off without a word, so - any idea where the parents are?"

Charlie shrugged. "They were around a few hours ago. Maybe they're outside. Mum's been redoing the garden again. When did she take up gardening?"

"Don't ask me, last time I was here, it was overgrown and full of gnomes. The kids all had tons of fun chasing them around."

"Ah, I see where this is going," Charlie laughed. "All right, little brother. Don't let me keep you. I'll floo over tonight for dinner, we'll talk more, then."

He left towards the kitchen, so Ron made his way to the door leading into the garden, and found his mum, wand in one hand, muttering spells, while she held on to a rake in the other, eyes narrowed. The garden looked good - there were flower beds evenly spread out over one half, trimmed grass on the other, growing daisies despite the heat. She had to water them regularly for it to look this good.

"Afternoon, mum," he greeted her, making her jump in surprise.

"Ronald!" she scolded him, letting go of the charm. He didn't know what she'd been about to do, but nothing exploded, so he was probably fine. "Don't creep up on people like that."

"I didn't," he protested. But before he could explain, she was already hugging him, muttering about how she never saw him anymore and how's Harry, dear, is he eating all right. She'd always had that obsession with Harry and food. Ron found himself enjoying the familiarity of it all.

"You're seeing me now," he said. "Harry's fine, I think he even gained a few pounds since our teenagers left for Hogwarts and he doesn't have anyone to play Quidditch with anymore."

"Good, good," his mum nodded approvingly. "Are you staying for dinner? Are you coming over for dinner, because I don't have much food in the house, and if you are, I'll need to break this up and floo over to the shop -"

"Not for dinner," Ron said. "Don't worry. But I was wondering about tomorrow."

"It's Sunday," his mum said, a thoughtful note in her voice. "Ignatius and Muriel are coming for dinner, but if that's all right with you -"

"Would they mind the kids?"

"Oh, no, I don't think so. Ignatius was so taken with them last time, and you'd better not deprive me of their company, you send them over far too little as it is!"

"That's because both Harry and I decided we didn't want to burden you with something that's our responsibility. It wouldn't be fair." Ron still wasn't convinced they weren't making a tactical mistake with this - after all, his mum had always said she'd love to have whichever of the children wanted to floo over - but Harry was adamant about not abusing the hospitality. Harry was strange like that.

"What about the new boy?" his mum asked, and Ron reminded himself that she had eyes and ears everywhere. He usually tried not to think too much about this.

"That's actually the thing. We wanted some time alone with Hazel - that's his name, by the way. We need to show him around the house and make him feel less uncomfortable around us. He's very scared, and he doesn't know where he is, and how long he'll be allowed to stay, so we have to be careful. Would it be okay if we missed tomorrow and came over with him another time?"

His mum looked at him for a few minutes, then her face softened with sympathy. "I'll have one of the monkeys take home a few plates of leftovers for all of you, of course. And tell Hazel I'm looking forward to meeting him?"

Ron smiled gratefully. "Thanks, Mum. You're the best."

She nodded, smiling back, and then turned towards her garden, flicking her wand towards the flowerbeds. "What do you think of those?"

"Uh." Ron squinted. "They look good?"

His mum snorted and then, of course, because she knew he would get in trouble for staying out too long, she made him take out his wand and help her with a few charms she couldn't get anchored just the way she wanted them.

 

~*~

 

"I'm going to kick your arse," Harry said to him when Ron returned to Grimmauld Place, falling out of the fireplace. He was standing by the table on which April, May and June were doing a puzzle, hands on his hips. He also had his wand nearby, which was unusual. Harry never walked around with his wand anymore.

"I'm sorry," Ron said, throwing up his arms. "I went over to the Burrow and Mum held me up. Can you believe it, she's gardening now."

"This doesn't absolve you from just vanishing on me," Harry said curtly. "I had no idea where you went, and you didn't even leave a note."

Ron stepped closer to him, careful not to disturb the kids in their game, to apologize by kiss, but Harry didn't let him. His scowl didn't lessen either.

"I'm sorry, all right? I thought I'd be in and out before you knew it."

"You went to see your mum, Ron. She hasn't seen you in weeks, of course she was going to want to spend some time with you."

"Yeah, well. C'mon, don't be mad at me. It was for a good cause." Ron touched Harry's arm, looking down at him with pleading eyes.

"Don't do that," Harry told him, but Ron could see he was softening. Sometimes, Ron felt a little guilty about how gone he was over Harry, but then things like these reminded him that it was mutual, and he felt immediately better. Also, it really had been for a good cause.

"Mum's willing to take the kids tomorrow, so we can spend some time alone with Hazel, show him around the house, make sure he knows where the kitchen is and who the other kids are. Get to know him better. And maybe... you know?" Ron's smile turned dirty around the corners.

Harry rolled his eyes. "We shouldn't have done that this morning. We shouldn't do that tomorrow, either."

"He'll be tired after wandering the house," Ron reminded him. "It'll take about a week until he's stronger, Healer Brown said so. And Mum'll keep the kids till late evening."

"We'll see," Harry gave in. Ron grinned inwardly. Yeah, right. "You're not out of the doghouse yet, though. I was running around like a headless chicken for a while there, shut up, it's not funny."

"Are Sheryl and Talin okay?"

Harry shrugged, and this time, he accepted the kiss, probably because it wasn't a bribe-kiss, but a sympathy-kiss. Ron touched his ear gently and rubbed the spot behind it that Harry liked so much. "They're fine," Harry finally said. "I talked to them, Talin's probably with Hazel right now, letting him apologize, and Sheryl doesn't care what some strange boy thinks of her, as long as he doesn't hurt anyone, you know what she's like. I'll try to find out why he dislikes her."

Ron nodded, kissing him again. "You taste like apples."

"Made some yoghurt for Betty," Harry said. "Cut some apples for her."

"I want apples, too," April said from her seat, turning to face them. She looked expectant.

"Me too," June chimed in immediately, waving a puzzle piece through the air.

"I want bananas," May said proudly, because of course, she had to be different.

"All right, all right," Ron told them. "How about I make a big bowl of all kinds of fruits, and you pick out the ones you like best. You'll be like Cinderella."

"Yes!" May and June exclaimed happily, while April made a face and said, "But I don't like Cinderella."

Harry laughed, pecked Ron's mouth once more and headed out of the kitchen, leaving them in Ron's capable hands.

 

~*~

 

Talin went to bed late that night, later than the rest of the house. Dinner with Hermione and Charlie had been nice, at least the part he'd been there for - but he'd also thought of Hazel up in his room, all by himself, and that had made him go spend most of his evening there instead of in the kitchen with everyone else.

It wasn't that Hazel had had little company - Harry and Ron kept checking up on him regularly, asking him if he wanted anything; they had, however, exchanged quick looks when Talin had offered to bring the food up to Hazel when Harry had wanted to do it.

Hazel didn't like the food much - when Talin had asked, he'd said he'd never had Chinese Muggle food before - and they'd spent the rest of the evening talking about other Muggle things Hazel had never seen or heard of before. Talin found out quickly that Hazel didn't know much about anything Muggle, and even though he didn't say it in so many words, Talin had a feeling he'd grown up confined to a pureblood household that had nothing at all to do with Muggles.

Still, it had been nice, especially because he'd never had the feeling he _had_ to talk. They'd sat in silence for minutes at a time, Hazel leaning back in his bed, resting his eyes, taking deep, even breaths, and Talin watching him, comfortable in his cushion seat.

When Talin laid down in his own bed later, he managed to fall asleep very quickly. He woke up barely three hours later, eyes heavy and burning, unsure why. He tried listening closely, but didn't hear anything, just the creaks and squeaks of the old house. He didn't feel like he would fall back asleep immediately, though, so he sat up in his bed, and that was when he heard it again. His room was closest to the stairs, sharing the third floor just below the attic. It was close to the children so he could keep an eye on them at night, especially when they wanted to sneak past his room and used the stairs. He was so attuned to footsteps on the stairs that the sound was unmistakable to his ears.

He was out of his bed in a split second, finding his slippers and silently sliding out of the door towards the stairs. There was no one in the hallway of his floor, so he made his way down one floor as quietly as he could - and this was where he saw the figure, sitting on the stairs, hunched over itself, shivering.

Talin thought for a moment that it was Billy, forgot that Billy was at Hogwarts along with the other teens, but the boy was just wearing Billy's pyjamas, which was when Talin stopped being confused. Hazel didn't look very awake when Talin crouched down on the step below, touching his knee gently. His eyes were half-closed and he was looking into nothing.

"Hazel," Talin tried. "What are you doing wandering around? You're not supposed to be out of bed."

Hazel murmured and ducked his head, his face screwing up with fear. It sounded like "I dunno where I am".

Talin rubbed his knee harder, and when Hazel still didn't look at him, he put his hand on his cheek. "It's okay, you're safe. It's Talin, do you remember me?"

Hazel nodded slowly. His eyes were beginning to clear, and he stopped shivering so much.

"Did you have a nightmare?" Talin asked slowly.

Hazel blinked, nodded. "I think," he whispered. "My mistress was angry with me. She told me to get out of the house. But I couldn't find the door."

"It's because you're away from there now. There's no mistress here, all right? You're at Grimmauld Place."

"Okay." Hazel sighed. He didn't seem to mind at all when Talin pulled him close, hugging him tight. Instead, his arms closed around Talin as well, and he breathed in and out deeply with relief.

 

~*~

 

Ron entered Hazel's room on Sunday morning for wake-up calls to find Talin curled up at the foot of Hazel's bed, half covered with the bed sheet, and Hazel buried deeply into the covers, both of them sleeping soundly. It was unexpected enough to make him stop in midstep, before he decided to leave again on the tips of his toes to not wake the boys up. He had a feeling they hadn't slept much last night, if they had somehow managed to find their way into this room together.

Harry was making the second pot of tea in the kitchen when Ron got back. He looked up with an expectant smile. "How is he? Is he up yet? Does he want breakfast?"

Ron shook his head. "No idea as to his well-being, he was still sleeping. So was Talin."

Harry's eyebrows went up. "Talin?"

"I don't know what they were up to last night - no, come on, not like that."

Harry flushed. "Shut up, it's not exactly far-fetched when you tell me they spent the night together."

"I doubt Hazel's up to very much right now," Ron snorted. "Talking about which, I should contact Healer Brown for a refill of those two potions he's supposed to be taking to get back on his feet."

"Oh, no, you don't," Harry said, putting his foot down. "You're going to take your child-rearing duty seriously and get them all up and dressed and coached into proper behaviour for their day at the Burrow, while I floo over to the hospital. Don't make that face, I know you, you'll be gone for hours again if I let you go."

"Tyrant."

Harry pointed his finger at Ron. "Don't even try to guilt-trip me. I'm still mad at you about yesterday."

"No, you're not," Ron said with a cheeky grin.

"Blowjobs do not count as an apology."

"I say they do." But Ron found himself giving in. "Fine," he said. "I'll take care of it. But you need to drop by the Prophet and see if everything's going according to plan. I gave Colin a big chunk of the responsibility this week, and I think Denis is good at the coordination, but I still feel like I should check in at least once a day."

"You can do that yourself in the afternoon."

"Harry."

"Ron," Harry repeated in the exact same tone of voice

Ron glared. "Fine. I'll subtract the time it takes me from your daily cuddle time."

"You wouldn't! That's the most important part of my _day_ ," Harry managed with a straight face, but when Ron just threw up his arms, he couldn't hold onto it any longer and started laughing.

"Shut up," Ron warned him with a half-smile. "It's a perfectly serious matter."

At that point, Sheryl entered the kitchen bleary-eyed, holding out her hand for coffee like a zombie, Betty hanging off the other hand, yawning and rubbing her eyes with her little fist, and they shelved the argument until further notice.

"Did you sleep okay?" Harry asked her, handing her a cup when they'd both sat down. "Betty, what do you want for breakfast?"

"Yeah, fine," Sheryl mumbled into her cup, not looking like someone who'd had gotten enough sleep at all, while Betty unthawed the moment she spotted yoghurt on the counter by the fridge, making a grab for it.

Ron laughed. "Hey, Sher?"

"Yeah?"

"You have the day off, you know that, right? Mum wants to see the little ones. We're not making you go if you don't want to, so, if you want to take the day to spend it with friends or something -"

Sheryl's head rocked up. "Really?" she asked, a look of hopeful joy settling on her face.

"Sure," Harry nodded, grinning at her expression. "And next time - tell us if it gets too much, all right? We can't really tell with you, and you never complain."

"It's not too much!"

"Don't," Harry said. "We keep saddling you with Betty, when we should be able to juggle everything ourselves. Thank you, though." He walked over and gave her a kiss on the top of her head.

Sheryl blushed. "You know I love her. I love them all. It's nothing less than any big sister would do." She waved her hand, obviously feeling awkward. "But if you really want to thank me, I would love pancakes for breakfast?"

"That can be arranged," Harry said. He made his way over to the counter to start the batter, but not before he touched Ron's arm, adding, "Will you go and wake up the top floor? We can feed May, June and April now, and send them off with Betty to the Burrow through the floo, and afterwards wake the boys."

Sheryl gave them a thoughtful look. "What boys?"

"Talin and Hazel," Ron said, looking impish. "They slept together last night."

"They didn't!" Sheryl exclaimed wide-eyed.

Ron smirked. "No, they didn't. But I did find Talin curled up at the foot of Hazel's bed this morning." He absent-mindedly wiped Betty's mouth with the tea-towel, as it was covered with yogurt from chin to nose, and laughed when Sheryl made a gesture like she wanted to hit him.

"You're impossible," she said. "Maybe they just talked until late in the night and Talin didn't want to go back to his room. Anyway, I don't care. Since Hazel doesn't like me, I'll keep away and enjoy my day reading some of the books I've been looking forward to, and I'll call some friends, maybe we can go see a film."

"You do that, love," Harry said. "We'll try to figure out about that reaction he had to you, though. Just give us a little time, okay?"

"Okay," Sheryl said and pointed at the stove. "Pancakes now?"

"I'm leaving, I'm leaving," Ron said when Harry looked at him and lifted his chin up to indicate the higher floors. "Just don't make a mess. I know how you are about the kitchen -"

"Out!" Harry said, and Ron left, snickering.

 

~*~

 

The secret of the sleepover was soon solved after the children were left at the Burrow, with his mum fretting over them and giving them biscuits first thing, and inviting them to play in the gardens, where she'd hidden some fun stuff all over. A pirate search for treasure, the kids called it, and took off without waiting for Ron to say goodbye. Ron accepted the hug his mum gave him graciously and promised Harry and him would come and stay longer soon.

When he got back home, Talin was in the kitchen, stacking a few of the leftover pancakes on two plates, looking shifty.

"Morning," Ron greeted him, dusting himself off.

Talin jumped and whirled to face Ron. "Morning?" he tried. Then he realized where Ron had come from. "You were out?"

Ron nodded. "My mum wanted to spend the day with the kids. You wanna hop over as well? I'm pretty sure she has biscuits for you, too."

Talin mock-glared. "Funny."

"Seriously, though, Charlie's there. You can just go for a few hours, they won't be mad if you leave early. You can pump him for information about what you can do, you know. For a job."

Talin started looking awkward, like he always did when the topic came up. "All right."

"Or you can just spend the day however you want," Ron added. He stepped closer to Talin and took a hold of his shoulders, squeezing once. "Sher is going to see a movie, you can always join her if you want. I'm sure she wouldn't mind."

Talin nodded. "Thanks. I'll - hey, Ron?"

Ron had stepped away already and made his way towards the kitchen door, but he stopped. "Yeah?"

"I'm sorry about taking up space and hanging around so long. I know there's a lot going on, and if I could just decide what to do - I mean. I will. And then I'll be out of your hair. I promise."

"No, come on. Don't talk like that." Ron put his hands on his hips. "You're part of our family. There's no way there's ever _not_ going to be room for you here. Didn't we already have this conversation? Take your time with your career - after all, you're going to be doing what you choose for a long time."

Talin nodded, cheeks red. "Thanks."

Ron grinned at him. "No problem, kid. By the way - if you want to, check in at the Prophet? I know you said you don't want to work there, but maybe you can at least get a look at what it's like, have grounds for comparison."

"I will."

"Oh, and - does this mean Hazel's up?" He nodded at the pancake-filled plate.

"Yeah," Talin said, looking awkward at being caught.

"Did anything happen last night?"

"Uh. Nothing out of the ordinary, I guess?" Talin shrugged, staring at the floor. "He had a nightmare, I found him sitting on the stairs. I got him in the bed and stayed. I hope that's fine."

"Sure." Ron smiled. "Have breakfast together. But then Harry and I will want to show him around and explain some things to him, and you really should get out of the house for a while yourself, have some fresh air."

Ron was glad when Talin half-smiled and gave in, because he'd been worried Talin would protest. He didn't like how quickly Talin had become protective of Hazel. He didn't know how good that was, or not good, but he would have become worried if Talin had strongly insisted on staying.

 

~*~

 

Hazel enjoyed the pancakes with Talin a lot, but a heavy feeling settled in his stomach when Talin told him Harry and Ron had cleared the house in order to spend some time alone with him. He didn't voice his concerns to Talin, because he could see the other boy wasn't too happy about having to leave.

He wasn't sure what exactly to be afraid of, but he also had no idea what to expect in general from being here, or from Harry and Ron, so he didn't say anything about that train of thought either. Instead, he spent most of the morning listening to Talin talk about different venues of work in the wizarding world - a few of which Hazel hadn't ever heard of, even. It was interesting, though. He knew that if he ever managed to free himself from people holding him captive, he would have to somehow earn an upkeep. And he had no idea if he could do Muggle work, or if he had to do some lowly work that wizards made squibs do which wouldn't require magic.

When Talin left - kissing Hazel on the cheek gently, which made Hazel turn warm all over, his stomach rolling in a way that was pleasantly sickening - he suddenly felt alone, though. He'd always felt alone, back at the mansion, and even before, the various places he'd been forced to stay at, for as long as he could remember. Somehow he hadn't noticed that something had changed in the matter of a day.

Even thinking of Harry and Ron made him feel better, despite him not wanting to feel better about seeing them. Talin was one thing - he'd shown, over and over, that the last thing on his mind was hurting Hazel, or anyone. He was gentle and kind and shy, and he had an air around him that made Hazel feel safe. Harry and Ron, though. They were. Especially Harry, there was something dangerous about Harry. Talin had even noticed that he didn't carry a wand, and yet he sometimes gave Hazel a sensation that was similar to that his mistress had evoked in him, like he should be scared, because she wouldn't hesitate to skin him alive if he misstepped.

Hazel tried getting out of bed after a while, growing bored of the books Harry'd brought to his room, and of staring at the ceiling. He'd managed in the night, from what Talin had said, even though he didn't remember what had happened. So he should be strong enough. He felt strong enough, too, even though, when he slowly slipped his naked feet to the carpet, a little dizzying spell caught him and he had to wait a minute before he could stand upright.

His head felt strange, and he wriggled his toes, just to feel their movement. There was a light pain in his right shoulder, where he remembered one of the pure-blood kids living at the mansion kicking him during 'play-time'. But overall, he was pretty certain he wouldn't keel over at the first step. He held on to the bed as he took it.

He wasn't nearly fast enough, when the knock came, to return to the bed before the door opened. He'd managed to step towards the shelves by then, and hold onto them while he scanned the school books and toys placed atop. It was good that they weren't sorted, just put out of the way until the inhabitant of the room returned and took them down to play.

After a second knock, Ron entered, carrying a change of clothes over his arms, and a towel.

Hazel had only met him briefly before, but unlike with Harry, he had to fight with his instincts which were telling him he could trust this person. Ron seemed to be easy-going and grounded, and utterly _kind_ , with his warm-bread smell and scent of fresh grass. He knew he shouldn't trust anyone that easily just because he felt comfortable around them.

"Oh dear," Ron said, holding out a hand to steady when Hazel stumbled in his haste to get back to bed. "Don't worry about it. We were going to try and have a walk around the house today anyway, if you felt strong enough. Are you all right?"

Hazel nodded sheepishly, and let himself be led back to bed, where he sat on top of the covers, but didn't lie down anymore.

"So, Harry's still at St. Mungo's, getting potions for you. One should be a strengthening draught. Do you feel dizzy still sometimes? Weak knees?"

"Yeah," Hazel heard himself admit, even though he wanted to say no.

"Healer Brown said that would be normal for at least a few more days. But the potions should help. She's good at what she does, so it would be good if you took it." Ron smiled brightly and handed him the clothes he was holding. "But first, how about you have a bath."

Hazel found himself frowning as Ron ushered him out of the room and down a hallway that looked vaguely familiar (possibly from last night), but also utterly new. It was brightly coloured, newly made-up. There was no wallpaper coming off, everything smooth and covered, the carpet as well, spreading warm and soft underneath the soles of his feet.

"I don't really," he tried. "I mean. I've had a bath before. But." It hadn't ever been very pleasant. When he'd been younger, his hair had been shaven short (against the lice, his mistress had said, and hexed the hair off whenever it dared to grow back), and later, it had been a bucket of cold water, unless he got a few minutes in a shower without anyone noticing.

"Don't worry," Ron said kindly, helping him to stay upright with an arm at his back, which Hazel really wanted to protest. "We'll figure it out as we go, all right?" And with that, he opened the door to the bathroom.

It wasn't a large bathroom, not like the ones for the family at his first estate - but there was a bathtub big enough for him to sit down in. There was a sink, and a mirror. The tiles were covered with little paintings of bubbles and fish and crabs wandering around. When Hazel looked in the mirror, he was surprised how pale he was - but also, how much better-fed than the last time. At least, if he was any judge. He'd had plenty of food yesterday and this morning, but surely, it couldn't show so fast.

"Here's your towel," Ron pointed. The water was already running, making a sound like a waterfall, coming out of three taps installed in the wall. There were bubbles too, pink ones and blue ones, which was unexpected. "Can you stand - if you can't stand for long, sit down on the toilet seat. Now, what I'll need you to do is check if the water's all right. That tap is hot water, that one's cold, and the last one's bubbles. You can adjust the water to the temperature you like by turning them. Unless you want me to stay, you'll have to do that yourself. Then you just - undress, jump in. Enjoy the soak. I'll knock on the door in about half an hour. I hope the clothes will fit you, my mum took some from my brothers who were more your size."

Hazel stared, feeling steamrolled.

"Any questions?" Ron asked, squeezing his shoulder gently.

Hazel shook his head.

"Great. Don't drown. If you need anything, just call. Especially if you're drowning. Call loudly. The house isn't exactly sound-proof, so either Harry or I will hear you."

And with that, Ron gave him one more encouraging thumbs-up and left for good. Hazel stared after him for a minute before he shook his head and got up off the toilet seat to start undressing. What the hell, he thought, if they'd wanted to hurt him, they'd have done so by now. Might as well get whatever he could out of this.

 

~*~

 

The rest of the day passed in a leisurely pace. Harry spent it keeping a step behind as Hazel latched onto Ron. Harry let him do all the talking. He couldn't lie that it nagged at his confidence when one of the children took a clear favour to Ron instead of himself, but then he always told himself to stop being an arse about it. It was _good_ when a kid, especially a boy so scared and shielded off as Hazel, took a liking to _either_ of them. It meant he was starting to trust them about where he was, and that he was safe, which meant he'd maybe open up soon, give them something to work with to make him more comfortable in the house.

Still, it hurt, because most of the kids took to Ron. Harry had no idea what it was about Ron that made him so attractive, or about Harry that scared them - and it was fear, he could tell sometimes, it had been especially obvious whenever he'd come close to Helena, the only child they'd accepted who hadn't worked out. And sometimes, he felt Voldemort tug on the string that joined them, just to give him a reminder that he was still there, that they were still bonded, and he wondered if it wasn't that, that part of him that was Voldemort.

They started with the second floor, where Hazel's own (if temporary) room was, pointed out where they slept together - it was a little strange, seeing Hazel suddenly realize that they were that sort of couple. Harry didn't know what he thought of it, because he kept his face so impassive most of the time, but there was at least no hate or disgust on his face, which had been so obvious back when he'd seen Sheryl. Actually, when he considered it closer, it had been more a sense of relief that had shortly crossed Hazel's eyes.

He was allowed a look inside, and Ron explained that he should come in whenever he needed something. "It can't be more than embarrassing," Ron teased. "And if you really need us, we'd rather be embarrassed and have the house not burn down to the ground, than the other way around, all right?"

Hazel actually smiled at that, which Harry noted with both a sensation of hopeful delight and a spike of jealousy because it hadn't been _him_ eliciting that response. But he was glad Ron was getting the boy to show his amusement. Definitely a good thing, he told himself.

They didn't go into what was now the shared room of Billy and Martin, and the room Epicia and Sonya shared. Both Ron and Harry went in often enough to clean up after their teenagers, but that was only when the four of them were actually at home. It seemed like a breach of privacy to show the new kid their rooms when they hadn't agreed to it. They'd been lucky, Harry thought, that Martin hadn't minded Hazel borrowing his room for a while.

The first floor was the part that Hazel seemed most interested in. They skipped Sheryl's and Betty's side-by-side bedrooms and Ron explained about the drawing room and library. It had taken a whole month to sort out the Dark Magic books the Black family had amassed.

"We call it a living room, now," he said, as Hazel touched the TV curiously. "That's a telefission," Ron said proudly. "Harry bought it back when we first thought about what to do with the room. It's pretty nifty, if you like moving pictures."

"It's a Muggle machine," Harry added. "But you don't have to watch it if you don't want to. There are enough books, and basically, it's meant to be a room where you can go to if you want to get out of your room and sit somewhere else."

Hazel gave him a long look. "Does that mean I can't go outside?" he then asked, voice flat.

Harry winced. "That's not what I meant."

"Of course you can go outside," Ron explained gently. "We'll show you the front door when we're on the ground floor, all right? There's a back door, too, but it just leads to this dark alleyway and some wheelie bins, so I don't think you want to go out that way. You're free to wander around London whenever you want, though. We're not holding you prisoner."

"Oh," Hazel said, suddenly looking vulnerable. "Really?"

"Well, yeah? You can talk to Sheryl if you want to leave. She knows her way around London, she grew up here. She can show you around -"

"No, thanks," Hazel said courtly, interrupting Harry.

Harry snapped his mouth shut, feeling strangely irritated. He did catch the warning gaze Ron sent his way, though, and decided not to voice any of it.

"It's all right," Ron said, breaking them up. "Just let us know when you want to go out, and we'll figure out how to provide you with a map and one of those mobile things and some Muggle money so you don't get lost."

"Muggle money?" Hazel asked.

They were still standing around the sitting room, with the couch and seats only a few feet away, so Ron took Hazel by the shoulders in a way that made him both look authoritative enough so that Hazel wouldn't try to slip away, but gentle enough that he wouldn't get scared, and led him there, making him sit down.

"You look exhausted already, and we've only covered two floors, so maybe we should sit down and explain a bit more about how we're not holding you captive," he proposed.

Hazel flushed. "All right. I just thought - I couldn't. Before. So."

"You definitely can now," Ron told him. "You don't have to stay here. There's actually a new law on its way that will make the Ministry provide for your kind for a specified amount of time, if you choose to live in the Muggle world. Thank the gods for Hermione and Neville."

"Who's -?" Hazel started, but then thought better of it, and asked instead, "How do you mean, my kind?"

Ron and Harry exchanged a quick glance.

"As we understand," Ron then said carefully. "You're what wizard folk call a squib? You can't do any magic, right?"

"Yeah," Hazel said. There was a bitter undertone to his voice, but his face stayed completely impassive.

"So it would stand to reason that, if you wanted to not live amongst magical people, you could change over into the Muggle world and live a normal life amongst them. What Hermione - she's Harry's and my best friend -, and Neville - who is the first advisor to our Minister of Magic - are trying to do is to get the Ministry to allot some tax money to support squibs to go to school in the Muggle world, or learn one of their trades, so they can support themselves later on."

"Right." Hazel's head was swimming. He didn't quite know what to do with that, so he ignored it for the moment and said, "But why would I need a mobile thing and Muggle money?"

"Because Grimmauld Place is in Muggle London," Harry told him. "So if you ever walk out the front door, you'll be amongst Muggles. It's funny, seeing as the Black family used to live here, and they were one of those pureblood families who hated Muggles. But it's nice for Ron and me, because we can not only take in children who were orphaned by Voldemort who have magical ability, but also children who are Muggles. For example, Sheryl is a Muggle girl - and so is May, at least we're pretty sure about that. And they can go to school here in London and have Muggle friends."

"What if I don't want to live in the Muggle world?"

"You don't have to, of course," Ron said slowly. "You're free to live wherever you want. But, Hazel - do you have a problem with Muggles?"

"What?" Hazel looked at him strangely. "No, why would I? I'm practically one of them."

"We thought - because you seem to have grown up amongst purebloods -"

"- that I'd buy the stuff they say about them? Because they say stupid stuff about me, too, and load of that's not true, so why would I believe anything anyone says?" Hazel was close to standing up, hands trembling atop his thighs.

Ron gave Harry a worried glance, and moved a little closer, touching his arm. "Come on, now. We were just wondering. There's nothing wrong with being either Muggle or a squib. And we're happy to have you here, no matter what you are."

"I'm not just a squib, though," Hazel said, his voice icy. "You don't really think they'd have kept a squib kid around this long if I wasn't of use to them? They'd have killed me long ago."

Harry gave Ron a quick look that pretty much said, "I told you so!" and turned to Hazel, trying not to sound like he was accusing him or thinking he might be dangerous. Even though that was exactly what Harry was thinking. If Hazel was really important to those Death Eaters, he could become really dangerous. Suddenly, he was glad he'd asked the Aurors to upgrade their wards.

"Can you tell us about that?" Harry asked slowly. "What they did to you?"

Hazel just stared at the floor, refusing to answer.

"Hazel," Ron tried. "We won't hurt you, we promise, but if you don't tell us, there's no way we can protect you, or our other children, from those Death Eaters." When Hazel didn't react, he added, "Do you at least know if they'll want you back? Are they going to come after you?"

"I don't know, all right?" Hazel blurted, and glared at his hands, not looking up. "How would I know? They left me behind, when they could have taken me along, so I guess not?"

"Right." Harry rubbed the bridge of his nose where his glasses rested. "Why don't we leave it at this for now. How about we go and check out the kitchen?" He turned to Hazel. "If you're going to stay longer, you should know where it is in case you get hungry. And I think we could all use a good, calming cup of tea before we talk some more."

Ron agreed, and Hazel didn't really have a choice, even though he didn't look delighted by the idea. So they finally got up and, Ron and Hazel up front, Harry following them more slowly, made their way one more floor down to get to the kitchen.

 

~*~

 

End Part 3  
  
---


	4. Chapter 4

_September - Monday_

 

 

The impossible happened Monday at noon.

It was so utterly improbable that for a moment, Harry thought he was hallucinating. He'd just been playing dolls with the four little ones, replaying a fairytale they'd heard the day before at the Burrow that Mr. Weasley had told them using scary voices, when the doorbell rang.

The doorbell never rang. Or rather, the doorbell hardly ever rang, because these days, Grimmauld Place was visible for Muggles (if not for wizards), and so they got the occasional parcel delivered because the neighbours weren't home, or salesmen trying to sell them soap or newsletters, or wandering minstrels - well. That had actually been a group of witches and wizards, but Harry wasn't sure if they'd been real ones. Probably not.

He'd left the kids to their own devices, at that point, and gone to open the door - only to reveal the one person in the world Harry Potter might have preferred to see never again in his lifetime (aside from Voldemort, so maybe it was better to say one of two people).

"What the fuck?" slipped out, despite the rule they had in the house about saying that word. It was a good thing none of the children were present. "What are you doing here?"

Draco Malfoy was standing on the doorstep, looking something between nervous and arrogant, which already made Harry want to put a fist through his face. He decided to reign himself in before he knew what was going on, and then punch him afterwards if he still deserved it, instead.

"Potter," Malfoy greeted. "Good to see you, too."

Then it occurred to Harry that there might be a specific, blond, pointy-chinned reason Malfoy was at his door, and that left him floundering between shutting the door in Malfoy's face and finding out what it was exactly about Hazel that was so fascinating.

And because Harry was an idiot who couldn't control his curiosity, he decided for the latter. "You're not getting him. Tell your pathetic little Death Eater friends that there's no way we're handing over any of our children without a fight."

Malfoy's face was a hilarious mix of incredulity and irritation.

Harry blinked. "There's not going to be a fight right now, right?" he asked, just to make sure. "Because in that case, I'll have to shut the door now -"

"No. No, no fight!" Malfoy said, and suddenly, he sounded downright desperate. He tried to put his hand on the door to keep it from closing and jumped back with a curse when it burned him. Harry thanked Ginny for teaching him that particular spell a few years back. "Look, Potter, I'm not friends with the people who - I'm not a Death Eater, all right?"

"Yeah, right," Harry said, rolling his eyes. "Go away, Malfoy."

"I just want to see him."

"So you can portkey him out of here, yes. I don't know what your kind has used this poor kid for, but there's no way you're abusing him any more."

"Ask him. Just ask him if he wants to see me, all right?"

"See you preferably never, Malfoy," Harry said, and finally managed to shut the door. Then he put his forehead against the thick wooden carvings on his side and wondered what the fuck Ron was doing working on a day like this, when they both knew Harry didn't use magic anymore, and they'd known someone might come after Hazel.

 

~*~

 

Ron came back immediately when Harry floo-called him, looking worried and scared, until he realized there was no immediate danger.

"What's going on?" he asked. "I was in the middle of a meeting -"

"You will never guess who just dropped by," Harry interrupted.

"Well? Who was it?"

"Malfoy," Harry said. "He just - came to the front door."

"What?" Ron stared at Harry for a moment, incomprehensive. "What did he want?"

"Hazel, apparently."

"Shit. Did he - where is he now?"

"I told him to stay way," Harry said.

"Harry..." Ron hesitated. "I get that the first assumption is always that he's one of the Death Eaters who want him back to continue doing to him what they used him for before, but. What if he's not?"

"Just because he's reformed on paper and donated loads of money?" Harry asked, sceptical. "That doesn't mean he actually has. You know how the Malfoys are!"

"I know, but come on. He didn't attack. He didn't even force the issue. He just went away when you told him to get lost? Isn't that a bit strange?"

Harry glared. "It's Malfoy. I don't know about strange. Maybe they thought I'd kill him right off the bat, and they were trying to get rid of him."

"Unless you've been practicing some serious martial arts, I don't think you would have a chance against Malfoy and his wand, sorry," Ron told him, scrunching up his nose. "C'mon, I hate him as much as you do, but it just doesn't make any sense. If those Death Eaters wanted to abduct Hazel, they would launch a full-blown attack on the house, not send Malfoy to the front door, who everyone knows we hate and would never let inside."

"Unless they thought we'd think that way and then let him inside because we thought he was safe, and once he's inside, you _know_ what damage a person can do to wards."

Ron sat down on a chair heavily and gave Harry an unnerved look. "What else can we do? He obviously has information, or wants something, or - okay, I'm admitting it. Hazel could be a Malfoy. What if he's just heard that we have him and wanted to check up on him?"

"That would imply Malfoy having regard for anyone but himself," Harry reminded him.

"Which I'm not implying. Not largely anyway," Ron admitted.

Harry snorted. "So what do you propose we do?" he asked finally. He couldn't think of a single version in which they weren't putting everyone in unnecessary danger. Especially since ignoring Malfoy would work out just as well.

"We need to find out what he knows," Ron said. When Harry made a face, he leaned in and grasped his hands. "We do. We need to know what we're in for here, and Hazel's clearly not going to tell us anytime soon. I don't think he wants to remember, anyway. It obviously hurt him."

"You want to invite him in?"

"Not really. But I can't see any other location beside the Auror Facility that would give us the same home-advantage, and I don't think he's allowed in there for security reasons."

"I'm not good with this," Harry warned him, pulling his hands away and going to the sink to grab the towel and start wiping clean the countertops and then the kitchen table. "I don't want him in here." Then he remembered something. "But he did say something interesting while I was closing the door on him."

"Yeah? What?"

"I should ask Hazel if he wanted to talk."

Ron pursed his lips. "There you have it, then. Let's go upstairs and ask."

 

~*~

 

Hazel's reaction was as predictable as it could have been. He was in the library where they found him sprawled over the couch with his feet hanging off one end, reading one of the books he'd found on the shelves. He looked almost happy to see them, until Harry told him what they were there for. When Ron asked him about meeting Draco Malfoy, he averted his eyes and said he'd never heard of such a person before. And the more Harry pressed, the less he wanted to talk, so that basically left them with a dead-end.

They left Hazel to his own devices again, then, and went back to the kitchen.

"Fine," Ron said, looking drawn. He rubbed his eyes, as if his thoughts were giving him the run-around. "Fine, but you know what? Let's just check something."

And with that, he marched right up to the front door and opened it; Harry was glad to see his wand was in the back pocket of his jeans, which he'd taken to wearing back when Harry'd introduced him to the comfort of Muggle clothes.

The utter shock came when Harry looked down and saw that Draco Malfoy had not actually left. He had obviously been sitting on the doorsteps from which he now rose gracefully, clearing his wizard cloak from the grit and dust on his backside.

"Right," Malfoy sneered. "Why am I not surprised to see Weasley joining the forces."

"Don't push it, Malfoy," Ron warned him. "For now, I'm actually willing to believe your story, which is not something you can say about Harry. So dazzle us."

"I wouldn't have come here," Malfoy said arrogantly, "But I read that piece of rubbish Prophet by accident this morning, and there was an article about the kids found in that raid in Wales. I asked some contacts, and it all led me to believe you have taken in one of them. A boy, about sixteen?"

"What's he to you?" Harry asked, eyes narrowed.

"I told you. I just want to talk to him."

Harry was just about to blow up, saying they'd already had this conversation and it had ended with the door in Malfoy's face, but Ron put a soothing hand on his lower back and turned to their 'friend' himself. "There's no way we're letting you anywhere near him unless you tell us exactly what you want and why you're here, and what he is to you."

"That's none of your business," Draco said through gritted teeth. He seemed to be sensing that he was losing them.

"Well, then, you're out luck," Ron said courtly. "Especially since we asked him, and he said he didn't know anyone of your name. Good day, Malfoy."

And with that, he closed the door, not giving him an opportunity to reply.

"Well," Harry said with a sigh. "That much for this route."

"Oh, don't count it out just yet," Ron told him, kissing his forehead as he gave Harry a long hug. "He'll come back." He gave a wry smile. "But maybe don't open the door anymore without at least having your wand at hand, will you?"

 

~*~

 

Right on track with Ron's prediction, Malfoy came back the next day, exactly at noon. He also came back Wednesday, but every time Harry asked Hazel if he felt up to talking to him, Hazel said he didn't know anyone of the name, and that he didn't want to.

The days were mostly spent with Hazel either sleeping in his room, recuperating still, the potions doing their work, or in Talin's company, the boys sitting together in the library or in front of the TV, with Talin, who'd spent the past two years getting thoroughly acquainted with Muggle culture, passing on his knowledge about the things that showed up on the screen.

On Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, Betty, April, May and June went to a friend of Harry and Ron's, who did some homeschooling for children from magical families to prepare them for Hogwarts, while Sheryl went to college, so it was the days Harry tended to spend either working out finances for their orphanage, or reading through legislation going on at the Ministry. He regularly visited Andromeda and Ted with little Teddy, too, but those visits were ones he didn't look forward to very much. He didn't feel like thinking about the Marauders much these days, and he had a feeling the baby knew how he felt, because Teddy didn't like him very much, always screaming his little lungs out whenever Harry wanted to hold him.

Wednesday morning, he had a class at the Auror Facility, which he taught to young trainees. That Wednesday, Draco didn't come back at noon, like he usually did, but later, at one, to be precise, which was when Harry was due to arrive back home. Harry felt himself grow annoyed at the implications.

"I wish you would stop coming here," he told Draco, opening the door despite Ron's warning. He had his wand with him at least - after all, he was fairly sure he wouldn't make a very impressive figure at the Auror Facility without his wand present.

"Can you at least tell him I keep coming back?" Draco asked. The sneer was gone from his face. He looked tired.

Harry reminded himself that he was Malfoy, no matter how often he sat on their porch, but he couldn't keep himself from saying, "We tell him. He doesn't seem to care."

Malfoy scratched his forehead, looking weary. "If he tells you he doesn't know me - what does he call himself, then?"

"Hazel," Harry said. "Talin gave him the name. He liked it, so it stuck."

"Talin?"

"One of my kids," Harry said, with an edge.

"Right. You're so domesticated now, aren't you," Malfoy said, with a hint of scorn in his voice. "Life as an Auror too dangerous for you, is it? Weasley's keeping you on a tight leash, making you open his doors -"

"Oh, shut your gob, Malfoy," Harry said and closed the door in his face. He rolled his eyes.

They'd talked about it, at the beginning, Ron and him, when they'd decided to go through with it. It had been Harry's idea, Harry's desire to do this, and while Ron had been all for the good cause, it had always been Harry who'd been the driving force. It was only fair he was the one who stayed home more often while Ron did what he liked to do, which was, surprisingly, writing for the Daily Prophet. Lee Jordan had been one of the people who'd dug the Prophet out of the dirt over two years ago, after Voldemort's capture, and Ron was now one of his main editors and writers, mostly for the sport section, and the sections about country-wide Death Eater movements.

He made good money, and he did a job he liked, and Harry was happy that he got to do that, especially when Harry himself got to do what he wanted, too, which was to save people. "Always about saving people," Ron sometimes said, with both fondness and exasperation in his voice. It was just something Harry couldn't help, really, he always had felt that way, and always would. Hermione called it his 'Hero syndrome', which was probably appropriate.

When he got out of his shower, Ron was getting the kids through the floo, and hurrying them to clean up and get ready for lunch, and Talin and Hazel had come to the kitchen, with Talin pointing at pans and pots they could use to start the meal.

Harry could see Hazel flinch away every time one of the kids passed him, and wondered if they needed to talk about this again, even if Hazel didn't seem to want to. At least, Harry remembered, he had seen Hazel talk with June - but never with any of the girls. Any girls, really. Even when Hermione dropped in, or Ginny, he watched them with either dislike or fear, and ignored the little girls completely. It didn't bother them especially - though April had asked him once if Hazel was shy, the way she tended to notice things - but it might start bothering them, if Hazel ever did anything that showed how much he didn't like their proximity.

But that, Harry figured, would be thought for later. For now, he was just glad Hazel had actually come out of his room to have lunch with them all. That was already a big step forward, these days.

"What are we having?" he asked, trying to get his hair in any semblance of order, while Ron took the little backpack off May and sent her on her way as the last one.

"Spaghetti," Talin told him, grinning, and handed Hazel the tomato sauce. "Always spaghetti when it needs to be quick, you know that, Harry."

"Right."

"Hey, love," Ron said, kissing him quickly. "Anything new?"

Harry kissed him once, too, and shrugged. "Not new, per se. The training was good. The newbies are getting better. Ginny dropped by to ask me about the kids, too. And then Malfoy was waiting for me again, right on time, which means he has my schedule. We exchanged some pleasantries, and I told him to get lost."

"Nothing new, then," Ron grinned. "I'll have a shower. Unless you wanna come with me?" He batted his eyelashes.

"Ugh, Ron, not where I can hear," Talin said loudly, blushing red over both ears.

When Harry glanced at Hazel, his face was impassive, not showing any of this thoughts. He wasn't looking in their direction, though, concentrating thoroughly on stirring the sauce in his pan.

"Keep your pants on," Ron laughed, and left the kitchen.

"We all will," Harry called after him. Then he went over to the kettle to make tea. "I take it you don't need any help with the food?"

The boys both shook their heads, exchanging a private little smile between them, so Harry retreated quickly, leaving them to their own devices. Maybe he'd join Ron in the shower, after all...

 

~*~

 

"Fine," Malfoy said on Friday, the fifth day he'd returned to ring the doorbell at their front door. This time, Ron had opened, with Harry by his side, both of them with their arms crossed at their chests, waiting if he'd changed his mind. Apparently, he had. "I'll tell you. Just... not out here, okay?"

Ron and Harry looked at each other, then Ron said, "You have chosen the shittiest day to give in. Wait here."

They closed the door again.

"You really want to let him in, don't you," Harry said. It wasn't even a question.

"Let's just send all the kids off to mum's," Ron shrugged. "He can come to the dining room, but no further, we should be able to deal with him."

"Yeah." Harry nodded, thoughtful. "I asked Ginny, and she said there's no way anyone can tap into the wards even if they're inside the house, either, so."

"Fine. Let's get this over with then." Ron gave a wry smile. "Mum'll be delighted."

Harry winced guiltily. "Tell your mum sorry from me, will you? We need to make up to her for this. Are you sure she isn't busy right now?"

"Harry." Ron stopped his march upstairs to get the kids and came back to Harry, stopping right in front of him. "My mother desperately needs to find something to occupy her mind with. She's started gardening. Mum _hates_ gardening. I'm pretty sure she has nothing else to do right now. But if you really want to make this one up to her, you can see if any of your contacts have a fun, light part-time job to offer a woman of a certain age."

Harry's shoulders slumped. "If you're sure."

"I'm sure." Ron grinned. "Believe me, she'll love having company. Did April tell you about the chicken-hunt?"

"Yeah," Harry snorted. "She told me. Your mum's crazy."

"So they say," Ron nodded. He gave Harry a kiss to his cheek and finally went on his way. Harry stared after him, before he turned back to the door and opened it again. Malfoy was still standing on the other side, looking impatient, and defeated.

"Can I come in, now?" he asked.

"Not just yet," Harry told him. "Ron's getting everyone out of the house."

"For god's sake, Potter, I'm not going to attack anyone -"

"We can't know that, can we. We're not taking any chances. Anyway, I'd appreciate it if you could give me your wand."

Malfoy stared at him open-mouthed. "No way," he finally said.

"Come on. I can't let you in the house with a wand. You must see that."

"I'm not letting you touch my wand," Malfoy said with indignation. Then it seemed to occur to him what he'd just said, because a light flush appeared on his cheeks.

Harry couldn't help the smirk. "As if I'd want to," he said.

"Right," Malfoy glared back, flustered. "You have your hands full with Weasley's."

"You did not just say that."

"At least your selective amnesia is good for something," Malfoy muttered.

"All right," Ron said, as he came to the door once more. "We've got the house to ourselves." He looked at Malfoy. "Wand?"

"Just give it here, Malfoy," Harry said, holding out his hand.

For a moment, he really thought Malfoy would turn on his heel and walk away, but whatever it was that made him so desperately want to see Hazel, it made him accept the terms. Harry found himself surprised, and not a little wondering if they hadn't been wrong about Draco. It took a special sort of affection to show this kind of determination about someone - unless, of course, it was all part of a master plan. Harry was suddenly very glad his kids were safe.

Malfoy's wand was polished and sort-of short, but it didn't protest the treatment, which was just as well. Harry placed it into one of the drawers of the dresser down the hall, and closed it carefully, turning back to catch Malfoy staring around the hallway in utter astonishment.

"What?" he asked.

Malfoy blinked. "I was here before, when I was a kid. My mother once brought me here, since she is née Black. You changed _everything_."

"Well, yeah?" Ron said with a note of sharpness in his voice. "We were hardly going to keep the gas lamps and the cobwebs, and that horrible portrait."

"Did you - did you install _Muggle_ lights?"

Harry grinned. "Yep. Ingenious, isn't it? It took Hermione and I ages to figure out how to connect the building to the electricity line, but it worked."

Malfoy didn't look like he thought it was ingenious at all, but he kept his mouth shut, to his credit. Harry hadn't thought him capable. He also looked a little shocked when they entered the dining room to find it cluttered with child's toys, dressers and shelves stacked with necessities. Since the kitchen was big enough for any company they had, they'd early on decided to turn the dining room into a storage space and play room for the kids if they wanted to go in here.

"Just sit down," Ron said, pointing at the chairs standing around a smaller table. They'd thrown out the huge, rotting wooden table that had stood here when they'd first moved in, because it had taken up too much space and had been infested with termites and worms in addition, and carried a table from the library here. The chairs were uncomfortable, with their finely carved backrests and hard seating surface, but good enough to sit in for shorter periods of time.

"And talk," Harry added, when they were all seated. Malfoy didn't look elated about this, but finally relented.

"His name's Senecio," was the first thing out of his mouth.

Harry and Ron exchanged a look.

"And I take it you didn't know that."

"We didn't," Harry said.

"Fine. Tell me how he is, then." When they exchanged another look, Malfoy sat up straight and his mouth pressed into a thin line. "I'm not going to be interrogated. I tell you something you don't know, you tell me something I want to know, otherwise, I'm leaving."

Harry could see Ron wanted to protest, but stepped in. "That's fair," he said, and shook his head when Ron opened his mouth. "What we answer is our choice," he told Malfoy. "We're not betraying any confidences."

"Just tell me how he's doing," Malfoy said, and rolled his eyes.

"He's as fine as can be, under the circumstances," Harry said. "He's still a bit shaken up, but it's only been a week, after all. He isn't up to his full strength yet - at least that's what his healer says -, but he's getting there. He's walking, and talking, and he's eating and sleeping well, as far as we know."

Normally, Malfoy wasn't very good at masking his emotions. He'd never been, even at school; in the past few days, Harry had seen that he wasn't hadn't gotten any better at hiding what he felt. It was one of the things that set Hazel and Draco apart so much in Harry's mind, because it was incredibly hard to read any of Hazel's expressions, his face most of the time so impassive and unfeeling. At these words, however, Harry couldn't have said what it was Malfoy was feeling. He couldn't tell whether it was relief or something else, or why the tension from Malfoy's shoulders fled, if it was because Hazel was healthy and safe, or because they had accepted the terms of the conversation and were giving him information in return.

"I don't remember a lot about him, because I was seven when he was born. You've probably figured out by now that he's related to me."

"We thought so," Ron said. "Though I have to admit, the family resemblance is minimal." He smirked. "He's more handsome."

"Than you? Not a big feat, though commendable anyway," Malfoy shot back.

"Back on topic," Harry reigned them in. "Malfoy, what exactly is his connection to the Malfoys? Is he your brother?"

Malfoy snorted in disgust. "Don't insult my parents, Potter, they would have rather stayed childless than to spawn a magicless brat."

"That's enough," Ron said coldly, tensing. "Either you give us some clear information now, or you get out of our home. I'm not going to listen to you spout hateful bullshit your Death Eater family stuffed between your ears because you can't think for yourself -"

"My father's sister," Malfoy said, just as icily. "She married into the Greengrass family. You may remember Daphne from Hogwarts. She's their first-born, and Senecio was supposed to be the male heir. But then the Hogwarts Quill didn't write him down as a future student. They pretended like it was a mistake, at first, hushed it up. Since they hadn't made an announcement yet and only the closest family knew they'd even had a second child, he wasn't acknowledged."

"That's horrible," Harry said. "All that just because he can't do magic?"

Malfoy turned to him with a look of derision. "It's not 'just' anything. It's a disgrace for the whole family when something like that gets out, especially a pureblood family. The Greengrasses could have said goodbye to their privileged status and their seats in the Wizengamot and the Council."

"And that's a reason to abuse a little boy?" Harry asked.

"They didn't abuse him -"

"That's not what he says," Ron interrupted. "Anyway, all treatment of squibs by purebloods aside, what else do you know about what they did to him."

"I only remember seeing him twice or so after that, mostly when we went to visit my aunt. Then I started Hogwarts, and I asked Daphne about him a few times, but she pretended like she didn't have a brother." Malfoy's tone of voice made clear that he'd used that little information not just once to make her do what he wanted. "Tell me what he's said? Has he told you anything at all about himself?"

"As you can see from our questions, he hasn't," Harry said. "He doesn't want to talk about what happened to him before he came here. All we know is that he was found by a group of Aurors, along with a handful of other children, when they went to check out a Misuse of Magic claim, but you probably know more about that than we do."

"As a matter of fact, I don't," Malfoy said. "Believe it or not, I don't have anything to do with that crowd."

"Yeah, right," Ron scoffed. "They were all pure-bloods."

"Who?" Malfoy asked.

"We're not going to tell you that." Harry met Malfoy's gaze, not giving in on that one. Truth was, there seemed to have been members in that circle of Death Eaters no one had heard of before, which was worrying. But at least, Hermione had let him know that the four children who'd been left behind were a pair of siblings from a distant branch of the Lestrange family, a Montague girl and what seemed to be a distant relative of Theo Nott from their own Hogwarts days. It wasn't a secret that those families had been involved with Voldemort, and were on the run these days from the Aurors, working from the shadows.

"Fine. I can probably guess who it was anyway," Malfoy said.

"How did you hear about him?" Ron suddenly asked. "That wasn't in the article, I wrote the damn thing, I know what it said. It didn't give any specifics at all, actually. How would you know that he's here?"

Malfoy didn't reply for a long while. He was thinking how to answer that one, Harry could tell. It was a good question, though. If they had a leak in their ranks, it would be better to know now than later. Then Malfoy shrugged, like it was this or nothing, and said, "Ginny."

Harry blinked, incredulous, and felt Ron tense up beside him. He had to place a hand on his arm, just in case physical restraint would be needed in the nearest future. "What about her?" he asked through clenched teeth. He didn't like what Malfoy was implying, either, but it wouldn't do to jump to conclusions.

"Let's just say by some inexplicable twist of irony she got assigned to my case as long as I'm on - what are they calling it these days? - right. _Probation_." Malfoy's lip curled. "A Muggle word, I think."

"Ginny's the Auror sifting through your dirty laundry?" Ron asked, and as quickly as it had come up, the sudden tension was gone. Instead, there was a look of unholy glee on his face. "Oh, that is _precious_ -"

"Ron." Harry sighed. "Let's get back to the point. Why would she tell you about Hazel staying with us?"

"Hazel?"

"I told you, it's what he prefers to be called here," Harry said. "He'll have his reasons not to want to be called 'Senecio', don't you think?"

"How would I know?" Malfoy scowled. "I could ask him, if his _prison guards_ would let me near him."

"We're not his prison guards," Ron told him. "We've made sure he knows he can come and go as he pleases. He just doesn't want to see you. I just wonder why you want to see _him_. Since he's such a dirty magicless brat and all that."

Malfoy narrowed his eyes. "That's my own business and you can stay the hell out of it."

Ron got up, ignoring Harry's warning look. "Then get out."

"Ron." Harry tried to calm him down. "Look, Malfoy, you've been showing up on our doorsteps daily for the last few days. You either want something from him - in which case, he doesn't want to give it, and we won't be able to help unless you tell us what it is. Or you really care about him. In which case we're still lacking a connection. By your account, you haven't seen him since before Hogwarts. It makes no sense."

"And I told you, it's none of your business." Since Ron had stood up, nothing was holding Malfoy in his chair any longer either; it was funny to see Ron towering above him, with Malfoy desperately trying not to look like he was smaller.

"We'll see you out, then," Ron said, pointing his chin at the door.

They returned Malfoy's wand, even though Harry desperately wanted to see his face when they told him he wasn't getting it back, and he could see that Ron was thinking the same thing. When he was finally out the door, not without another cutting remark about their home, Ron leaned over and put his head on Harry's shoulder.

"There's no way to quantify how much I loathe the little ferret," he said with a sigh.

Harry grinned. "Maybe you can equal it with the amount of love you'll show me tonight," he teased.

 

~*~

 

That night, after they'd had sex, Harry was still feeling hard-pressed falling asleep. His mind was wandering, his thoughts circling what Malfoy had said, going over what they knew, and how that fit together.

He turned to his other side, and that was when Ron huffed and sat up enough to put his elbow up and his head on his hand, staring down at Harry. "What's wrong?" he asked.

"Nothing, really," Harry said.

"You've been tossing and turning for _hours_ -"

"- five minutes."

"Fifteen at least."

"Fine. Fifteen. It's - just the whole thing with Hazel and Malfoy. I just can't make sense of it."

Ron tugged him closer and breathed into his shoulder. "Why can't you let stuff like this go, ever?" he sounded exasperated again. "I love you, Harry, but sometimes you're the most exhausting person."

"It's important, though!"

"Doesn't change the fact that you won't be able to solve it all tonight."

"I can try," Harry said with half a sullen look in Ron's direction.

"Not if it costs me my precious sleep, you can't."

Harry sighed. "You're right," he gave in. "But we'll need to talk to Hazel about this tomorrow, you know that, right?" He had a feeling Ron wouldn't like that. "We let it go today because it was the first time he got out of the house, and using floo travel and being at the Burrow freaked him out -"

"Mum was ready to spit bricks," Ron said with a snort. "I wouldn't exactly call that freaked out. Good thing Talin was there, or they'd have strangled each other upon sight."

"And that's another thing we need to talk to him about. He can't go around reacting like this to every woman he meets -"

"He can try," Ron said.

"Well, he shouldn't. And maybe if we talk to him about what Malfoy said, it'll break those damn walls down and tell us what happened to him."

"Yeah," Ron said. "Except how about no."

"Ron."

"He hasn't shared any of what Malfoy told us with us, Harry," Ron said. "I hate to be the patient one for once, but when it comes to any of the children, we've always let them get there in their own time. Don't break the pattern now. It's worked so well thus far, there's no reason to bombard him with questions just because Draco bloody Malfoy wants to talk to him."

Harry laid back down, forcing himself to relax. Ron was right, of course. In a way.

"What if there are more kids like him?" he finally said. "Ginny's team just found the five, but what if there were more, and Hazel could help us locate the Death Eaters' next hiding place?"

Ron leaned over him, placing a gentle hand on Harry's cheek. His breath was warm against Harry's skin, and his body heavy and comforting. "Can't save everyone," he said. "You can't. And right now, we have Hazel to take care of. Anyone else is not our responsibility."

Harry squeezed his eyes together and turned to his side so he could put his arm around Ron and hold him close.

 

~*~

 

That, of course, was not the end of it.

Hermione showed up for breakfast the next day, a bearer of bad news. Since it was a Saturday, Sheryl was sitting at the table, drinking her coffee, sharing the pot with Ron. It was early yet, though, too early for the rest of the house to be on their feet. Even the smell of sausages hadn't yet managed to raise the sleeping from the depths of their slumber.

"You look like shit," Ron told her when she sat down next to Sheryl, grabbing one of the plates to bite heartily into a piece of toast.

"Thanks, Ron," Hermione said with a scowl, and Harry poked his shoulder.

"What?" Ron shrugged. "Just telling the truth." He turned to Hermione. "You look lovely the rest of the time, if that helps, which only makes the difference between now and those times more obvious."

Sheryl giggled into her cup of coffee. "I'll have to remember that one for when I ever need to talk myself out of a ditch," she teased.

"I might be 'looking like shit', to repeat Ron's eloquent choice of words, because there's been quite a bit of trouble hanging around the kids Ginny's team rescued," Hermione explained. "It's not just that everyone's suddenly either a self-proclaimed, unofficial godparent or too busy to show up to any of the hearings. There's also been some trouble with the magical examinations."

Harry took his seat next to Ron and handed her a cup of tea. "Their magic's altered?"

"Just the Lestrange siblings. They're calling it 'Tainted Magic' now. Kingsley has been trying to stop the use of that phase, since it's insulting towards the witch or wizard in question, but it's been sticking."

"Better than 'abomination', if you ask me," Ron snorted.

Harry winced. "Thanks, Ron."

"I told you, they can call it whatever the hell they want," Ron said, "You're not one of them. You're not."

"My magic's not exactly _right_ -"

"Well, it's not wrong either," Ron snapped.

"Okay, give it a rest," Hermione stopped them before they could get back into it. It was an old argument that they'd been having ever since Harry'd found out after Voldemort's capture that doing magic wasn't the same anymore, that something about it was _off_ , and that it was almost surely Voldemort's fault.

"You let Professor McGonagall test them?" Harry asked, ignoring Ron's glare.

"Yes," Hermione said. "We don't know what to do yet. I'm pretty sure the Department of Mysteries are going to want to examine their magic in the next days and weeks. Which might be just as well, because not a single closer relative of theirs has come forward to claim guardianship. They're six and nine years old, for heaven's sake."

Predictably, the rest of the meal passed in awkward silence. It wasn't, after all, like any of them could do anything. The alteration of magic - 'tainting' as people called it now - had been going on for almost two years, and no one had yet found out why it happened or where its origin lay. Not even questioning Voldemort under Veritaserum had given any answers to that question, and as far as Harry knew, he hadn't spoken of it ever since.

 

After breakfast, Ron left for the Prophet's offices, since he had to cover a Quidditch match in the afternoon, and had to go interview players and referees and fans for his articles, and Sheryl told Harry she was going out with some friends to the library to study for upcoming exams, which only left Harry and Hermione in the kitchen, looking at each other morosely.

"He's going to get over the magic thing," Hermione tried.

"Don't." Harry sighed. "Don't try to make it better. He's never going to understand that it feels wrong now. He thinks I'm just making stuff up, but I'm not. Every time I do a spell now - do you know how usually, when you do magic, it feels like a part of you? Like despite it being away from your body, it's still - like a piece of your life force, or something?"

Hermione nodded, quietly listening.

"It's not like that anymore. It feels wrong and twisted, when it comes out. Like it's anything _but_ a part of me."

"Have you talked to Luna about this?" Hermione asked awkwardly. "I know you find most of the people working at the Department creepy, but you like Luna. She might be able to help."

"Luna's busy," Harry said.

"She's never too busy to see you."

"She told me last time I asked that there's nothing anyone can do." He gave Hermione a hard look. "That was the only time I ever saw her looking sad like that for me. She never used to."

Hermione nodded. "All right. Well, to be perfectly honest, it's not like you need magic all that much anyway. You're not running around looking for adventures, as far as I know, and it's not like you can't do all the menial tasks witches and wizards do by magic by hand. I've always said - why use magic, when a hard day of work might actually be good for you." She smiled.

Harry smiled back, grateful for her support.

"But Harry." Hermione hesitated.

"What?"

"The reason I actually came over. I was wondering about Hazel in the past few days. I know we've all said he's a squib, but he can't just be that. This is Death Eaters we're talking about. They kill and rape and torture without regard. Why would they keep a young boy without any magical abilities around?"

"Funny you should say that," Harry told her. "He said the same thing a few days ago."

"He did?"

"He didn't want to say _what_ they were doing to him, though. He seems really scared thinking about it. He doesn't even want to talk about it."

"Harry, we have to know," Hermione told him. "It might be the key. Look, this is just a theory, but. I've been reading some of the documents Luna has let me see, and I've talked to Aurors who've been working with Death Eaters and it looks to me like it's coming from their ranks, maybe not from Voldemort specifically, but something he did, or something some of the Death Eaters did. It spreads like it's some sort of infection that carries by use of magic. I don't know what spells yet exactly, but I talked to Heather and Amaryllis - the Lestrange girls - and they told me there was definitely something going on in that group. They couldn't tell me what it was the adults were doing, but they seemed to be taking Hazel away quite a lot, especially in the last few months before they were discovered."

"I don't know," Harry said. "I wish you could go ask him, but I can pretty much guarantee that he won't talk to you."

Hermione raised her eyebrows. "Why not?"

"He doesn't like women. He can barely deal with the little girls as it is, though at least he's cordial to them, as long as they leave him alone. They had to go over to the Burrow yesterday because Malfoy dropped by -"

"Malfoy dropped by?"

"- yeah, I'll explain later. And Hazel apparently showed himself from his worst side to Mrs. Weasley."

"Ow," Hermione commented. "Why do you think that is?"

"The woman thing?" Harry shrugged. "As big a mystery as anything else, at this point."

"And Malfoy?"

Harry snorted. "There's a bit of a longer story there. You got some time?"

Hermione glanced at her watch and leaned back in her seat, taking a sip of tea. "Plenty of time," she said. "Feel free to give me the long version."

 

~*~

 

Talin was sitting on Hazel's bed, playing a game of chess with him, when Harry knocked and entered. Talin wasn't exactly happy about the interruption - for once, he was the one with the better starting position, and that happened rarely enough, because Hazel was _good_ at chess. Still, it was Harry, and from time to time, he did come in to check on them, if only to ask how they were doing. It was really sweet of him.

Talin only realized how much time he'd been spending with Hazel when he thought back to the past few days and actually _remembered_. For a moment, he floundered not quite sure what to make of that. He _liked_ Hazel, insanely well, but he'd never been the type of person to stick to a friend so close. Even with Alison - god, Alison, they hadn't talked in a _week_ \- he'd preferred time on his own to going out every evening to hang out with her or her friends.

It was just... It was a good feeling, to be wanted and _needed_ like this. It was obvious Hazel still didn't feel too secure around the house, even though in the past few days, he'd lost some of his inhibition and started to believe that he was safe here. A lot of it was Harry's policy that no one use excessive magic in the house unless they absolutely couldn't help it, so Hazel hadn't had to watch others flaunt their magic before him. But most of it, he was pretty sure, was that no one had hurt him for as long as he'd been here, which seemed to be a new development that Hazel hadn't really expected.

But Talin was still the one he liked spending most of his time with, which felt good.

"You boys doing okay?" Harry asked, interrupting his train of thoughts.

"Yup," Talin said, and greeted him with a smile. He saw that Hazel even managed to bring up the corners of his mouth, and grinned at that.

"Would you mind if I had a little chat with Hazel?" Harry asked.

Talin gave Hazel an encouraging smile, which Hazel returned by nodding and smiling back - wider than for Harry, with shining eyes, which made warmth pool in Talin's stomach, like he was _special_ \- and then Talin turned to Harry and said, "Yes, okay." To Hazel, he said, "I'll be back in a while, okay? You want anything to eat or drink?"

"I think Hermione brought you guys some snacks, actually," Harry told him. "You can get them, if you want."

Talin waited once more for Hazel's okay - he wouldn't leave if Hazel didn't want him to for sure; but Hazel shrugged and made a 'what can you do?' face, so Talin took the board off the bed, placed it carefully on the nearby desk, just in case they could resume their earlier game, and closed the door behind him when he finally left the room.

"If it's all right with you, I'd like to talk to you about something from before you came here," he heard Harry ask through the door, and considered, for just a moment going back in to tell Harry to back the fuck off, because if Hazel wanted to talk about it, he would. He'd talk about it by himself, without having to be _asked_.

But then he reminded himself that this wasn't actually for him to decide. He wasn't Hazel's parents, or his brother or - or anyone, really, except his friend, and Harry, for all intents and purposes was Hazel's guardian, together with Ron. And maybe there was a reason he needed to ask _now_. He'd said, after all, that Hermione had dropped by.

He heard a murmur, Hazel's voice, but no words he could make out, and gave himself a kick. Listening in wasn't going to help anyone. He could, however, go downstairs and see if Hermione was still there. Maybe she could tell him more.

 

~*~

 

And then, in the evening, everything went to shit.

Talin didn't even know what had happened. Everything had seemed fine, even though, when he'd returned to Hazel's room about an hour after he'd left, finding Harry already gone, Hazel had seemed sad and tired and he hadn't wanted to play chess anymore. His eyes had been a little glazed and red-rimmed. He hadn't said anything, though, just pulled Talin close and they'd hugged for a while. It wasn't something Talin usually enjoyed, or even initiated. Talin had found that he didn't mind, though, when it was with Hazel.

But then, at dinner, which Hazel had skipped declined because he wasn't hungry, but Talin had gone to the kitchen for, because he _was_ hungry, Ron had started talking about how he'd seen Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy in the Quidditch stands for the Magpies, and how money really did buy anything in life, and Harry had said, "By the way. We - uh. We should maybe try and contact Malfoy soon. I - I think Hazel wants to talk to him."

Ron's face showed surprise at the words, then shock, suspicion and anger so quickly Talin had trouble catching up. Then his expression turned eerily calm and he got up from his seat to go to the kitchen counter and hack up some bread.

"Ron." Harry winced.

"What the - just." Ron threw the knife down and turned to stare at Harry. "What were you _thinking_?"

"I didn't do anything wrong, all right," Harry said, standing up now as well.

Ron rubbed his eyes. "Who wants to go have dinner in front of the TV?" he finally said in the general direction of the kids, who had been watching their exchange open-mouthed, forgetting to chew.

"Yes!" "Me!" and a few more "Yes!" floated through the kitchen as Betty, April, May and June immediately jumped off their seats and grabbed their plates.

"Go on, then," Harry told them, never taking his eyes off Ron.

"We should go as well," Sheryl said quickly, giving Talin a look.

Talin blinked at her. He had a feeling he knew what was going on, but he didn't quite want to believe it. "Shouldn't we try and -"

"No," Sheryl said firmly. "Come on." She grabbed his arm and tugged. "Never interfere when the adults are fighting," she whispered at him.

"But they're fighting about Hazel," he muttered.

"Okay, you _have_ to stop this strange thing you have for him, Talin," Sheryl told him to his face once they were out of the door. She let go of his arm and shook her head. "I don't know if you're just, like, totally in love with him, or if it's something worse, but snap out of it. You've been spending all your time with him, and it's not healthy. He's not all right, and you can't think of _anything_ but him anymore."

"I'm not - that's not true," Talin said weakly.

"Think about it," Sheryl told him. "I'm here if you want to talk." Then she hurried off towards the stairs.

Talin winced when Ron's voice carried outside, half-yelling, "You _promised_ you'd not push him, we agreed that it doesn't matter what anyone says, he's the most important thing right now."

"Hermione agreed with me that it would be foolish to wait any longer when there's more at stake -"

"I hate it when you do that," Ron hissed. "I hate it when you pull that 'we must sacrifice this because of everything else that's at stake' shit, because it never ends well, and you know it."

"He didn't exactly protest when I asked him about the things -"

"That's because he trusted you, you idiot, and you abused that trust to what? Save the world?"

"I didn't," Harry said, and Talin felt his stomach turn at the pain in his voice. He didn't want to hear any more. He didn't know what to think, or who was right, or why they were fighting. He just hoped Hazel was all right, and that Ron was wrong about Harry and that they would stop fighting now and go back to being the perfect, happy couple he knew and loved.

But when he got to the second floor, and looked down the hall, Sheryl's words repeated in his head, over and over, how he needed to snap out of it and stop spending every second of every day with him, and he hesitated, because it wasn't like it wasn't _true_ that he did. He just didn't know what was wrong with that. Only that it didn't feel totally right, in the back of his mind, where his heart couldn't quite dim and blur the reason, and where he remembered that he actually had wanted to have a life outside of Grimmauld Place some day, and a job, and his own flatapartment and stuff.

And that in the past week, he hadn't done a single thing to get that.

 

~*~

 

End Part 4  
  
---


	5. Chapter 5

_September - Monday_

 

 

Draco Malfoy met Hazel on a rainy Sunday afternoon, two weeks after Hazel had first arrived to Grimmauld Place on a stretcher, pale and hungry-looking, unconscious and bruised.

No one aside from the two of them got to hear what they talked about that afternoon, because even though first Harry insisted on staying with Hazel, and then Ron, Hazel refused any and all company but Draco's.

All that remained from that afternoon's image in the minds of the inhabitants of Grimmauld Place was Draco Malfoy's drawn face, red-rimmed eyes as he left the room, not looking at anyone, no clever lines or sneers in anyone's direction, and the fact that Hazel spent the rest of the evening and the night by himself in his room, crying, and telling people to get the hell out when they wanted to come in and console him.

It wasn't a crying of the horrible, tragic sort, but it wasn't laughing-crying either.

 

~*~

 

"You have to make up," Hermione told Ron in the week following this. She'd been dropping by more often these days, taking her work to their kitchen or their library, so she could stare reproachfully at them over the rims of her spectacles (which Ron still thought were probably for show, despite her insistence that she was far-sighted).

"We don't have to do anything," Ron told her.

April, who always was where Hermione was whenever Hermione came to visit, crawled out from underneath the table and stared up at Ron with huge eyes. "Is Harry and Ron going to break up?"

" _Are_ Harry and Ron going to break up, sweetie," Hermione corrected her. Then she nailed Ron with her gaze. "Don't worry. They _aren't_."

Ron narrowed his eyes at her. "I'll break up with you if you don't stop being annoying."

Hermione pushed her glasses up her nose, unfazed.

"And I'm not talking to you anyway. You're an evil enabler. You're the only reason he broke our rule anyway, if you hadn't talked to him that morning about how he had to save the world, Hazel wouldn't have been pressured to give in."

"Oh, come off it," Hermione glared. "Hazel isn't the type of boy to get pressured into anything. Look at him, he had a mother who made him call her 'Mistress' and made him absorb horrible spells, and instead of turning into a squeaking little mouse, he's now hating all women alike and showing them his teeth. Not that I approve, but it's the principle of the matter."

"Lalalalala," Ron sing-songed, putting his hands over his ears. "I can't hear you."

"Ron," little April said, hands on her hips, trying to imitate Hermione's voice and eye-roll. "That is _not_ age-appropriate."

Hermione burst out with laughter and held out her hand for a high-five, and April gave it to her, giggling as if she'd used a dirty word.

 

~*~

 

"You are being ridiculous. Both of you," Sheryl told them the next morning over breakfast.

Harry and Ron were sitting on opposite ends of the long table, with Ron staring into the pages of the Daily Prophet, while Harry was preparing his next class at the Auror Facility, with both doing their best to ignore the other.

"Ridiculous," Betty repeated, nodding her head. Her face was smeared with yogurt, and Sheryl couldn't wait till her next birthday so they could finally change her favourite food group.

"I completely agree," Ginny said, stepping out of the floor network, after the fire turned green with a whoosh. She was getting the sooth out of her hair while she said it. "Now, why do I need to get up at nine in the morning on my day off, and which of you prats sent me that Howler."

"I didn't, but I'm glad to see you anyway," Sheryl told her. "Would you maybe knock some sense into those two with your super Auror powers, because frankly, I'm at the end of my tether."

"Let's see." Ginny stalked over to the middle between the two, and pointed at Ron. "Ronald Bilius Weasley, get your head out of your arse and stop being a stubborn little git, because it's not attractive, and also, holding a grudge is so not going to get you more sex." Then she pointed at Harry. "And you, whatever you did, just fucking apologize and be done with it already. We both know there's no way Ron will admit to being wrong, so you might as well suck it up and admit defeat."

Sheryl almost expected it to work.

Then Ron slowly turned another page in his Daily Prophet and said, "I don't think I have to listen to people who consort with the likes of Draco Malfoy and give him information on their own family," with a bit of an edge.

Ginny put her hands on her hips, narrowed her eyes, and then snapped up her wand quicker than Sheryl could follow with her gaze and managed to hit Ron with a spell that made him tap-dance the whole way up to his room where he'd left his wand so he could unbind himself from it.

 

~*~

 

The thing was - Hazel never looked at him with any air of reproach, which made the whole situation even worse. Talin could have done with a bit of reproach. He felt like he was abandoning his best friend, and that made him feel so guilty. He just didn't know what else to do.

He'd taken Ron up on the offer to check the offices of the Daily Prophet. It had been fun, but it wasn't what Talin wanted to _do_ for the rest of his life. He'd talked to Charlie, but working with dragons, while fun in theory, was also dangerous, and required lots of travelling and it was dangerous. Talin didn't actually want to do anything dangerous for a living. There was a reason he'd been sorted into Hufflepuff and not into Gryffindor.

"You'd have been a Ravenclaw, I think," he said to Hazel one evening when they sat beside each other on the couch in the living room, with the TV on mute running in the background. Sheryl had brought them hot chocolate - which Hazel hadn't wanted to touch at first - and they were just feeling the day come to a close.

"That's a Hogwarts house, right?" Hazel asked slowly. "I read about that in 'Hogwarts - A History'."

"Which is exactly why you'd be a Ravenclaw," Talin grinned.

"Well-read, then," Hazel guessed.

"Clever, yeah. And unafraid to state their opinion. Just wanting to know things is enough. I think you always want to know things, even if you don't ask yet."

Hazel touched his hand with his fingers, almost like he wanted to console Talin. "I heard Ron and Harry fight again today. And Harry's been sleeping down the hall, in another room."

"Don't worry about it," Talin told him. "They just fight sometimes."

"Like this?"

"Well, no. It's a first that it's been going for days. But they have us, right. And it's not - they're just - it's not something like, no one cheated or anything. It's not something they won't get over, after a while."

"It's my fault though, isn't it?"

"What? No!"

"It's about me, though." Hazel was looking right through Talin and his cheap hair-splitting.

Talin flushed at the inquiring gaze. "Yeah, fine, you're part of what they're fighting about, but it's not like you made them fight. They have their own stuff to sort out. It's definitely not your fault."

"They wouldn't be fighting if I hadn't come here."

"It's not like you chose to come here, exactly," Talin reminded him. "We pretty much abducted you."

"I chose to stay here, then."

"Which is not what Harry and Ron are fighting about. If they knew you were talking nonsense like this, they'd stop fighting right away. They don't want you to feel guilty about staying, okay?"

Hazel nodded slowly and turned back to the TV, even though he didn't seem to actually watch the screen.

"If you really must know, it's - Ron thinks Harry made you tell him about what happened to you, before you came here. I don't know if that's true or not." Talin swallowed, shaking his head when Hazel opened his mouth to reply. "I think if it was true, I'd be mad at Harry too. He had no right -"

"But he didn't." Hazel frowned. "It's - he didn't force me to do anything. He just asked if I wanted to talk to him about it. He didn't even - he told me afterwards that with the information, they could maybe work on something that's been happening in the wizard world, but not before. He just asked, and I sort of thought. That it would be all right. You know?"

Talin let out a breath he hadn't known he was holding. "That's good," he said softly. "It's good that you didn't feel like he made you tell." They sat for a while in silence, then Talin turned to him more fully and licked his lips. "Do you - do you want to tell me?"

Hazel's gaze dropped to his lap and he pulled in his shoulders, looking uncomfortable.

"Forget I said anything," Talin quickly said when he realized, drawing a sharp breath. He tried hard not to be hurt, but the sting was still there. He'd thought - but here he was doing exactly what he'd been about to condemn Harry for. "Don't worry. Tell me what else you read in 'Hogwarts - A History'."

"Talin." Hazel bit his lip. He still wasn't looking at Talin, still keeping his gaze averted, like he was ashamed of something. "I just don't want you to think - I don't want your _pity_ , all right? With Harry, I knew. I don't know how, but I knew he wouldn't do that. He'd just listen and not do all that stuff where I'm a poor kid and my life's been so horrible. I'm not, and it isn't."

"I can do that," Talin said. "I swear. Look. My parents died two years ago, I've had exactly one friend in school, I don't have any idea what to do with my life. Are you feeling sorry for me?"

Hazel half-smiled, his eyes glittering a little with amusement. "No?" he said.

"Then I'll do the same for you, okay?" Talin promised.

"All right," Hazel gave in, taking a deep breath.

 

~*~

 

When Hazel finally dropped off - telling his life story had taken a lot of strength - Talin disentangled himself from his grip, and got up from the couch. He found a blanket in the dresser by the west wall, and covered him up with it before he slowly made his way downstairs into the kitchen.

He caught Harry on his way up the stairs, and said, as innocuously as he could, "Hey, Harry, I just need to check something in the kitchen, but could you wait for me in your room? I need to talk to you about something."

It didn't take long to find Ron, who wasn't actually in the kitchen, but in Betty's room, getting her ready for sleep. Talin waited patiently for him to finish, then tugged his arm and said, "Come with me. I need to show you something."

And then he actually had them both together in one room that wasn't as large as the kitchen. The tension in the room went up exponentially when they realized what was going on.

"Talin?" Harry asked, a warning in his voice.

"No," Talin said. "You shut up for a second and listen to me, both of you." He had to actually swallow not to stumble over his own words, but he was also very angry, and that helped, even though it made him talk louder than he'd intended.

"I don't care how fun it is for you two to be mad at each other or whatever, but you're scaring the kids, even though they're not showing it, so stop it. Hazel told me all about what happened with Harry and then with Draco - by the way, I don't know about any school rivalries, but don't you think it's time to grow the hell up about stuff like that? He just asked Hazel if he needed a place to stay, okay, it wasn't like he was planning an assassination, and Hazel wouldn't have gone with him anyway, what with the whole pureblood family and doing-everything-by-magic thing."

He blinked, realizing he'd lost his thread somewhere.

"What, exactly -" Ron started.

"No. No, no, no, I'm the only one talking here," Talin interrupted him sharply. "Wake up, all right? Hazel isn't a six year old boy you need to rescue. He is old enough to make his own decisions; talking to Harry about what happened to him? That was one of his own decisions. He has the right to make those. But right now, you're upsetting him with your fighting. He thinks it's his fault, and he even said that he maybe shouldn't be staying here if all that came of it was break-ups."

Ron and Harry had the grace to look a little embarrassed at those words, at least. Talin glared a bit more, just to make sure they knew that he was _really_ angry.

"So I'm going to go upstairs now," he said, "and help Sheryl get April, May and June to bed, and you better get this sorted out, because Hazel's _fine_ , unless you don't stop fighting. Then he won't be fine, because then, he'll probably leave. So." He hesitated, felt a flush climb up his neck at the sudden realization that this was completely out of character for him, and added, "Good night?" before ducking out of the room and locking himself in the next possible bathroom to put his face underneath some cold water and tell himself he hadn't just gone completely insane.

 

~*~

 

"Wow," Harry said, when Talin had been gone for barely half a minute. He blinked. "That told us."

Ron threw up his hands and turned to Harry, face still hard. "It doesn't mean I'm fine with you going behind my back. It doesn't mean I'm fine with how you handled this."

Harry glared back. "You know what, you can stop now with that self-righteous accusation thing you always do whenever something's not going your way. I'm sorry I went behind your back, but I resent that you think I would pressure a little sixteen year-old boy into anything!"

"Fine. Did your little experiment at least get you anything worthwhile? Has Hermione found a way already to get your magic right -?"

"Oh, shut up, that was never the objective, and you know it, but as a matter of fact, yes. She found a few texts that refer to 'purging', which is apparently a means to use passive magic-users in order to filter magic -"

"Okay, you know what, I don't even care," Ron interrupted him.

"Of course you don't, all you ever think about is yourself!"

"You didn't just say that -"

"I did, and I'm going to say - mfgh."

Kissing him was a proficient way of ensuring Harry _didn't_ actually say anything more. Ron pressed his lips to Harry's and didn't wait a second before pushing his tongue into Harry's mouth. It was harsh, dirty, and thoroughly enjoyable, especially since Harry fought back like a lion, trying to get control over the kiss.

They landed on the bed with a loud thump, scuffling for who'd end up on top - it was always Ron these days, always Ron, not that Harry couldn't just as well make him suffer from his position underneath - and then it was a scramble to get off shirts and trousers and boxer shorts and licking and sucking and _biting_ until they were both ready to dissolve, panting and not quite so angry at each other anymore as they had been at the beginning.

 

~*~

 

The garden at the Burrow was overgrown again, huge grasses covering spots while others, though mowed, were blooming with daisies and dandelions. It was a sunny day, especially for early October, one of the few left, Hazel thought, before it would get rainy and cold and later, maybe snowy.

He still didn't like Mrs. Weasley at all - she liked to order people around, and he always reacted to that with his hackles rising - but her home was beautiful; he'd been sad when he'd heard that Grimmauld Place didn't have a garden. It had always been his favourite thing to do, back when he'd lived at the Greengrass estate with his mistress. The Weasleys' garden was enormous, though, which he'd found out the first time he'd been here. He especially liked the huge apple trees in the orchard.

Talin was sitting next to him in the grass today, a frog in a hand, listening to it make funny sounds depending on the charm he used on it. The adults were all inside the house. Harry and Ron regularly missed this particular meeting to have a bit of quiet time while Ron's mum took care of the children, but Mrs. Weasley hadn't let them get away today.

And, from the sounds that had come from their room the night before, Hazel had a pretty good idea why they didn't need any private time today.

"You're being quiet," Talin said softly when he'd finally charmed the poor frog back into its original voice and let it hop away, towards the pond.

"I'm just thinking," Hazel said.

"What about?"

"Things. Harry and Ron, mostly. They made up last night, didn't they?"

Talin nodded, lying back into the grass.

Hazel looked at the way the sun made his hair shine, his smooth skin, and his eyelashes resting on his cheeks. He didn't know what to do with himself when he got that feeling in the pit of his stomach, so he looked away quickly and continued, "That's not a coincidence, is it."

"What exactly?"

"That they made up right after we talked."

Talin sighed. Then he heaved himself up again and pulled up his knees, looking half-sheepish, half-guilty when he shook his head. "I... might have gotten angry at them for being stupid. So I got them in their room together, yelled at them to stop being stupid, and then, uh - one thing led to another?"

Hazel felt his mouth fall open. "You what?" He could not imagine Talin yelling at anyone, least of all Harry and Ron.

"I know, it's - at least they forgave me. And it ended with them having sex and making up, right, so it helped?"

Hazel couldn't stop the laugh that escaped him, belly-deep, just bubbling out. He couldn't remember the last time he'd laughed.

"Oh," Talin said, softly, still with his knees pulled up, and when Hazel sobered, he realized Talin was staring, with wide eyes, almost like he'd just seen some kind of revelation.

"What?" he asked, rubbing the little tear from the corner of his eye that had slipped out.

Talin smiled, his cheeks reddening, and he didn't quite meet Hazel's eyes when he said, "Just. Your laugh. I hadn't heard it before."

"Oh," Hazel repeated, and felt like an idiot. "Okay?"

"It's beautiful," Talin said.

Hazel felt himself flush in response, and was glad that he could blame the cool wind for the colour in his cheeks.

 

~*~

 

Harry and Ron were watching the boys through the window to the garden, just glancing out now and then. There was still a little bit of raw tension between the two of them from the past week of fighting, but today mostly, there was embarrassment. Ron very much remembered that they hadn't even thought to put up a silencing spell last night.

It was nice, though, sitting at the Burrow, even though Percy'd joined an hour ago with Penelope, and was now dominating the conversation by talking about his job - same old Percy, Ron thought with an inward grin, catching Harry's eye - and Charlie was still there, with May on his lap, showing her how to work a dragon yo-yo so that it made the sounds of a roaring dragon for her, and his mum and his dad, listening while keeping an eye on June and April, who'd taken their pieces of cake into a corner and were playing with animated teddy bears that had once belonged to Fred and George.

Ron barely heard the whooshing sound of the floo network over the rumble of conversation and playing children. He wouldn't have if he hadn't been once trained to identify exactly such noises in the midst of common noises, so he was almost prepared when Ginny also stepped into the living room, saying, "It's so cold outside!" while at the same time taking off the coat she was wearing. "Hey, everyone, hi kiddos! See, I told you they'd be here today," she said to someone who wasn't yet visible, and suddenly, Ron had a sinking feeling of complete certainty who that was going to turn out to be.

"Who're you talking to?" His dad asked. "Did you bring a guest - oh."

All conversation stopped, even Percy, when Draco Malfoy followed Ginny into the living room, looking as uncomfortable as Ron had ever seen another human being.

"Malfoy," Ron heard himself say, in a voice that was half-animosity, half-greeting, and wondered at himself where that had come from.

"Ginny?" Percy asked, incredulity making his voice higher than usual.

"No worries," Ginny rolled her eyes. "He's not here to burn down the house, calm down. Anyway, he's under my thumb for now, so if he misbehaves in front of me, there'll be trouble." She gave Malfoy a strangely intimate, yet sharply warning beam.

"Mrs. Weasley. Mr. Weasley," he greeted Ron's parents. Then he nodded at everyone else, before he cleared his throat, looked between Harry and Ron and asked, "Hazel?"

Ron could see Harry's eyebrows reach his hairline, and he couldn't hide his own disbelief, though Harry beat him to it.

"He's outside," he said, not without a certain bite. He turned to Ginny. "Take his wand."

"Potter -"

"No, actually, he's right, Draco." Ginny held out his hand to her companion. Her grin didn't vanish, but it did turn calculating around the edges. "Hand it over."

"You've got to be kidding me -"

"Not a bit. Give it to me, or I'm confiscating it for good," Ginny said sweetly.

"Fine," Draco spat out, handed over his wand, and then marched to the door Harry'd indicated, making his way into the garden without looking back.

Ginny's gaze followed him out. Ron wished he hadn't caught how it lingered on Malfoy's butt before she turned to her family, crossed her arms in front of her chest and said, "I really love my job."

 

It didn't take long, after Ginny had settled down to have a piece of cake, for Talin to come back inside. Ron and Harry had watched the exchange take place outside, and it was clear that Hazel had agreed to spend some time alone with Malfoy, indicating that it was okay for Talin to leave.

"What's he want?" Ron asked first thing when Talin sat down next to him; he could see that his mum and dad, and even Percy, were curious to hear the answer to that question.

Talin raised his chin. "I'm pretty sure, since his first question was 'How are you?', that he's been worried about Hazel, and wants to know how he's been?"

Ginny snorted into her tea.

"You left your friend alone with him?" Percy asked. "Is that a good idea?"

Talin shrugged. "He was okay with me leaving. I'm not his keeper."

"But you like him, right?" Ginny grinned.

"No I don't," Talin replied quickly, before he realized what he'd said, and corrected, "I mean. Of course I do, I just don't - I mean. Not. And anyway, it's not like he's - and I'm going to be moving out in a few weeks anyway, so it's not like we're going to be seeing each other a lot."

"Wait, you are?" Harry asked, frowning. "Why?"

"You really shouldn't leave your home early, dear," Mrs. Weasley chimed in, handing him a cup of tea so he could warm up. "Enough time to do that once you've grown up a little. You have your whole life ahead of you. There's no need to rush."

"I'm not rushing," Talin said. "I just think I'm ready. And anyway, I've been talking to Healer Brown, and I think being a Healer could be a good job for me. She said I could learn from her, since I've been taking such good care of Hazel."

"Poor Hazel," Ron commented, which earned him a kick in the shin by Harry. "What?" he turned to Harry, hurt. "I'm just saying, I'm sure he he'll be missing Talin terribly."

"Shut up," Talin said, hiding his face. "He won't. You're making stuff up to embarrass me."

"No, I'm not. I'm just rooting for the two of you. I need a happy ending here. Harry and me, we're not a happy ending, we're just going to keep fighting, but Hazel and you - no, wait. Damn, Hazel's part-Malfoy, isn't he? So first Ginny's crossing over into enemy territory like that, and now you? Don't do this to me. Don't mix our proud Weasley blood with whatever it is Malfoys have in their veins. I _weep_ for future generations."

Harry hit his arm. "You're such an diot, Ron," he chided. "And anyway, it's not like they'll ever have kids." He turned to Talin. "You won't, will you?"

Somewhere to his right, Ginny spluttered.

Talin shook his head and buried his face deeper in his hands. "You do know I'm not _actually_ your kid, right?" he asked, just in case they'd forgotten. But they just patted his arm and gave him those smiles he hated, the ones that said, 'You have no idea what you got into, staying with us, do you?', and really, what could anyone do against those.

 

~*~  
 **Epilogue**

~*~

 

"I was right," Hermione said smugly a few evenings later, dropping in on them while their whole little clan was sitting around the kitchen table, eating fish and chips, which had been announced with a great amount of cheering by June, May and April, and even Betty, who'd agreed not to have any yogurt, just for tonight.

Hermione grabbed a plate and pushed a chair in between Harry and Ron, piling on some chips.

"Right about what?" Ron asked, sounding a little bit afraid.

Hermione bit off the end of an especially long one and said, "Everything, of course."

A few spots down, Talin was trying to get Hazel to talk to Sheryl despite Hazel's angry hissing in her direction, while June and May were battling for the ketchup. As always, Betty had managed to attract every substance that could be smeared all over one's face. And April had followed Hermione the moment she'd shown up, and was now bouncing up and down behind her chair.

"But mostly," Hermione continued, "about magic. As always."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry asked, fighting hard to hide a smile. In a lot of ways, she hadn't changed at all, and Ron caught his eyes, winking, because he was thinking exactly the same thing.

"It means you're coming with me tomorrow morning, bright and early, so Luna can do some tests on you. That purging ritual I researched the whole weekend is going to help us get to the bottom of whatever is altering magic. No protests."

Ron shrugged at Harry, and Harry sighed in defeat - not that he _minded_ , per se. "Fine," he said. "But you need to find someone to take care of the kids, because Ron's got meetings at the Prophet tomorrow -"

"Let them come with," Hermione said with a shark-smile. "I'm sure we can find a few people with nothing to do who can show your little ones the pillars of our society."

"Uh-oh," Ron mumbled into a piece of chicken.

"Well," Harry said, good-natured. "Our children are well-behaved, so it shouldn't be that hard on whoever gets stuck with - oh."

Because in that moment, June managed to somehow magic the ketchup bottle into splitting in half, draping both May and himself into thick, red tomato sauce, and Betty of course couldn't leave any mess without joining right in, so she jumped hands-first into the puddle forming on the table, licking it off her fingers with loud laughter that put Voldemort's evil cackle to shame.

"You were saying?" Ron said with a huge grin.

 

~*~

 **The End.**   
(for now)  
  
---


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